Pennington Flash

Mute swan and cygnets

I decided on a visit to Pennington Flash today, thinking that it wouldn't be busy on a cool drizzly day. I'd forgotten that the people of Leigh are hardy souls who make it worth an ice cream van's time to trade on a Winter's afternoon. Luckily, busy though it was everyone was behaving impeccably, trying as far as possible to make room for social distancing and still being friendly about it. All the hides were closed of course. An old chap I've seen a few times before stopped and said to me: "I'll be glad when they're open, I'm having withdrawal symptoms."

The usual collection of mallard, coot, mute swans and Canada geese were on the flash. Families of Canada geese with their goslings congregated in small rafts. Tufted ducks were scattered around, one female swimming across the flash midwater had half a dozen ducklings in train. There was only a handful of great crested grebes which is rather less than I'd expect usually.

Canada geese and mallard

There were small numbers of gulls about, mostly black-headed with a bunch of lesser black-backs loafing around near the sailing club and on the spit and just the one herring gull. I could only see a couple of common terns, one flying by the far shore and one loafing at the end of the spit. Small flocks of swallows and swifts hawked low over the water.

Lesser black-backs

The paths were busy so most birds were heard rather than seen. Robins, wrens and song thrushes, predictably made the biggest contribution with blackbirds and chiffchaffs not far behind. A reed warbler was singing by the Tom Edmondson Hide.

From the screen by the Ramsdale Hide I could see a family group of gadwall, the ducklings all being nearly full grown. The same could be said for the young little ringed plovers skittering amongst them under the supervision of one of the parents while the other foraged closer to the hide.

Little ringed plover

Little ringed plover

A lapwing shows us just how little a little ringed plover actually is

Carrying on along the path the trees thinned out and a couple of whitethroats made themselves known. A couple of sand martins flew overhead towards the flash, possibly to join the small unidentifiable flying objects beyond the sailing club.

I wasn't really enjoying the crowds and the hides being closed limited the birdwatching so I decided to take a walk down the Leeds and Liverpool Canal back into the town centre. Willow warblers and chaffinches sang from the woodland by the canal and three pairs of Canada geese kept an eye on their twenty-six goslings as they dawdled about on the path to the irritation of dogs and cyclists. As I neared the town centre a small flock of house martins flew overhead and then circled higher to join some swifts that seemed to have found a rich cloud of insects.

Willow warbler

Back into the town centre in time to see the 126 bus back home leave the station. Ordinarily Plan B would be to get the V1 to Sale Lane and get the 132 down to the Trafford Centre but the current emergency timetable makes that connection very iffy so I got the 34 down to Worsley, thinking that I'd have twenty minutes to explore an interesting looking footpath and get back for the next 126. Dead waste of time that was: the footpath had been comprehensively fenced in so it was nothing more than a very long ginnel going nowhere. Back at the bus stop a kestrel hunting low over the field across the road was a nice consolation prize.

The little ringed plovers bring the year list up to 140, which isn't so bad in the circumstances.