Elton Reservoir

Ruddy duck, Elton Reservoir

I was only half in the mood for a walk today. In the end I decided to spend an hour or so at Elton Reservoir to see if yesterday's common scoter had decided to linger (there have been a few dropping in on reservoirs around Greater Manchester and I keep missing them). I decided I'd just have a wander along the South shore (I didn't fancy a mud bath) then get the bus on Bury Road; if I felt energetic I could take it to Ringley and have a walk through Outwood and if not I could get off at Radcliffe tram station.

I decided that the first garden dragonfly of the year — a common hawker in the back garden — was a good omen. Seeing a kingfisher shooting across the Irwell as I was passing on the tram was another.

Mute swan and cygnets

The usual suspects were on the reservoir: a couple of dozen mallard, the mute swan family, twenty or so black-headed gulls and the best part of a hundred coot. Pied wagtails skittered about the water margins and house martins hawked over the water. The juvenile great crested grebes are nearly full-grown now. A couple of common terns spent more time noisily flying about than fishing.

Juvenile great crested grebe

Great crested grebe

There are much worse things in this world than having a sit down by a picturesque reservoir on a sunny afternoon. I was thinking this as I was concluding that all the black dots on the reservoir were coots. Then a few more dots floated into view as they swam out into the water from a small bight on the North shore. A few more coots and half a dozen tufted ducks. And something else.

First sighting: ruddy duck, coot and tufted duck

My first ruddy duck for eleven years!  It drifted slowly closer, diving for food every so often along the way.

Common tern

The terns also came in closer as they did circuits of the reservoir. In the end the ruddy duck kept about a third the way out from shore. A fine male showing very well.

Coot and ruddy duck

I was of two minds about logging the sighting (I'm not convinced of the need to cull this species). I did in the end, leaving it to the judgement of site moderators whether or not to suppress it.

Back home on the tram desperate for a pot of tea.

Not quite Martin Mere

Jackdaw, Wigan Wallgate Station

I keep thinking about a visit to Martin Mere but they quite rightly and sensibly are only taking booked visits at the moment and that doesn't fit in with my way of getting up in the morning and deciding what I feel like doing today. Then I remembered that there's still a decent walk to be had between New Lane and Burscough Bridge via one or other of the meandering footpaths. So that's what I did today.

I changed trains at Wigan (there's a through train from Oxford Road but I decided I'd prefer to hang around in the open at Wigan for half an hour rather than twenty-five minutes at Oxford Road). No ravens today but I was joined by a jackdaw in rather downy moult.

I got off at New Lane and followed the path that runs beside the railway line. Not having a couple of hours at Martin Mere on the itinerary I had plenty of time to check out the water treatment works to see if there were any waders other than the pair of oystercatchers I'd been hearing since I left the station. There weren't but there was a couple of dozen each of starlings and pied wagtails and a mixed flock of house martins and swifts overhead. A flock of black-headed gulls took umbrage at a buzzard as it slowly flapped it's way towards New Lane.

Brown hawkers patrolled the ditch along the line and made forays across the path to put a scare into the insects feeding on the thistles, fumitories and mustards on the field margins. The thistles were also busy with goldfinches.

As I approached the pedestrian railway crossing I thought I could see a couple more buzzards over Martin Mere's reedbed. They floated closer and turned out to be a couple of female-type marsh harriers.

Greylag geese

A couple of dozen greylags were quietly feeding on the field across the line. It's not often you see greylags doing anything quietly. A kestrel hovered over the rough field on the other side of the path, the swallows feeding low over the grass moved over to another field just in case.

I followed the path down into the section where the boundary to Martin Mere's reedbed walk is defined by a high hedge. Chiffchaffs and great tits made it known they'd spotted me as I walked past. Just as I was coming to the little reed-filled pond the hedgerow was suddenly full of birds: a family of sixteen or so long-tailed tits, a family of great tits, a couple of blue tits and two or three chiffchaffs flitted about. Trying to keep track of them all and count them was a great demonstration of the effectiveness of safety in numbers, especially when a large part of that number caper about like a barrel of monkeys.

Juvenile long-tailed tit

Looking over the gate between the hedgerow and the reedbeds I could see more greylags on the pool in mid distance, together with a couple of coots, a mallard and about thirty lapwings.

A couple of reed buntings were singing from the reeds and a willow warbler called from one of the hawthorn bushes. There were more brown hawkers, together with a couple of common hawkers and a common darter. A banded demoiselle was kind enough to sit still long enough to have its photo taken.

Banded demoiselle

As much of a tawny owl as I've seen since March

More swifts and swallows overhead, plus another marsh harrier carrying something in its feet as it flew over towards the mere.

Instead of turning into the path to Martin Mere I turned into Tarlscough Lane and walked into Burscough. Flocks of swallows hawked low over the fields of barley. A big flock of a hundred or more house martins fed over the fields and farmyard at the corner of Curlew Lane. I kept checking the potato fields for yellow wagtails but no joy. No joy finding any tree sparrows either. I'd almost given up on corn buntings until I heard one singing in the field across the road from the horse paddocks. I was so intent on trying to see where it was singing from I didn't notice the buzzard sat on the telegraph pole next to me until it flew off and spooked a trio of woodpigeons.

So it turned out to be a nice productive walk even without the visit to Martin Mere.

Local patch

Barton Clough

Had a teatime stroll round the local patch in between showers. It was very quiet, most of the birds were were set down for an early roost to get out of the wind.

• Black-headed Gull 2 
• Blackbird 9 
• Carrion Crow 1 
• Chaffinch 1 
• Dunnock 1 
• Feral Pigeon 12 
• Goldfinch 9 
• Great Tit 1 
• Greenfinch 1 
• House Sparrow 2 
• Lesser Black-backed Gull 5 
• Long-tailed Tit 1 
• Magpie 6 
• Song Thrush 1 
• Starling 1 
• Whitethroat 2 
• Woodpigeon 21 

Wet in the Wirral

Juvenile herring gull begging from its parent

I'd been hoping for the opportunity for a day at the seaside and, as today was set for Rain Stopped Play I thought it would be safe to give it a go. The plan was to use a combination of an old man's day explorer on Northern and a Merseytravel all-day saveaway to have a wander on the Wirral coast and then move up the Section coast and get one of the Lancashire lines back home. That was the plan. It was only when I got on the train I realised I hadn't taken my waistcoat off before donning jacket and raincoat. "I'll be sweating cobs," I thought. I needn't have worried.

I got the train out from Manchester to Liverpool, thence on the Wirral Line down to Moreton. I had considered starting at West Kirby but there's not a lot of cover there if the weather wasn't going to be fun whereas there's some tree cover around Leasowe Lighthouse.

Swallows, Kerr's Field

I wandered down from the station to Kerr's Field. As I looked over the paddocks I felt a bit sad at having missed the Spring passage here this year. I've caught up with yellow wagtails since and I expect I'll bump into a wheatear on Autumn migration but I suspect I'll have to write off white wagtails for this year. As it was, the thistles were full of goldfinches and swallows were already lining up along the fences and the telegraph wires. Half a dozen black-headed gulls loafing in a field in varying stages of greyish and white faces completed the late Summer feel of things.

The weather had cleared into a drizzle so I headed for the walkway above the beach. The tide was receding and already there was a quarter of a mile of wet mud before the waterline. The first things to strike my eye were a couple of large groups of oystercatchers, a couple of hundred all told many already showing their Winter collars, and the groups of half a dozen little egrets in each of the three largest pools.

Little egrets

There were plenty of gulls overhead but only a few dozen on the ground and they evenly scattered about. Even numbers of herring gulls and lesser black-backs. Here and there were an obvious family group. A third-Summer great black-back was chased off by an angry lesser black-back despite both its young being fully-grown. One of the immature herring gulls was making a nuisance of itself.

Herring gulls. Enough is enough, the parent got tired of the youngster's begging

Oystercatchers

There were plenty of redshanks dotted about, mostly working the soft mud on the edges of the pools. There was a couple of dozen curlews, too, showing a wide range of sizes and bill lengths. I think the smaller individuals were young birds still not quite full grown though a couple of them (females?) had unmistakeably long bills. Whimbrels stop off on the Wirral on passage so I scanned round hopefully. It was a bit of a challenge — a combination of gloomy light, the presence of the small curlews and the fact that they all had pale eyebrow stripes that were picked out in the gloom — but eventually I found a couple in the mid-distance. After a couple of minutes they decided to fly off towards Meols, the clean bright whites of their rumps and lower back confirming the identification.

Curlew

The weather was deteriorating by this stage and the wind picking up so I thought I'd best crack on towards Meols.

Approaching the groyne that's the halfway marker between Leasowe Lighthouse and Meols I noticed a couple of turnstones and a linnet were feeding on the seaweed stranded at the base of the breakwater. A little further on the edge of the breakwater became defined by a line thirty or so redshanks, a combination of adults still in Summer finery, adults taking on greyish Winter hues and youngsters still in their tiger pyjamas. A dunlin in full Summer plumage flew in.

Redshanks

More little egrets, gulls and redshanks by the groyne with a couple of curlew close in. Halfway to Meols there was another dark patch of oystercatchers. The weather was pretty grim now. I was barely ten yards beyond the groyne when the wind decided to blow a hooley and the rain came lashing down.

You know the weather's taken a turn for the worse when even a curlew's fed up of it.

I took the hint and turned back for the comparative shelter of the wooded area by the lighthouse. Three sand martins whizzed past me into the wind, which goes to show they're more aerodynamic than I am. A couple more dunlin flew in and hunkered down amongst the redshanks.

The worst of the rain had passed by the time I arrived at the pond near the lighthouse. A couple of dozen swallows and a few swifts were feeding about the treetops.

Leasowe Lighthouse

I carried on down the road past Kerr's Field, in the hopes that I might spot a stonechat or two (I didn't). A few more black-headed gulls had settled on the field, joined by some herring gulls and lesser black-backs and a couple of common gulls. A sedge warbler had a despondent moment of song from the ditch by the road. This was the only warbler of the day. Three ravens in one of the paddocks was a bit of a surprise, an adult and two beardless youths hopping about the long grass by the fence.

The wind had almost blown my trousers and raincoat dry and there were tantalising hints of blue sky on the horizon. I'd spent a couple of hours here so I wandered back to the station and debated where to go next. By the time the train got to Bidston the weather had persuaded me to go home. I went the indirect route via Wigan, which turned out to be lucky as while I was waiting for my train at Wigan Wallgate another raven flew by towards the bus station (I don't know how ominous that is). Ravens seem to be on the increase in Greater Manchester.

Lazy Saturday

Juvenile great tit

It's gone a bit quiet in the garden again now the young spadgers have been shown where to find the feeders when they need them. They come in in small groups of three or four supervised by one or two adults. I've filled one of the feeders that's almost hidden by bushes so they've got a bit of cover rather than lining themselves up like targets on the garden fence.

Rowan tree in my back garden

In lots of ways we're settling into Autumn already: the first of the common gull has arrived on the school field, the first mixed flock of blue, coal, great and long-tailed tits has descended on the feeders and the garden has been filled with the songs of robin and wren. The rowan tree is heavy with fruit so the blackbirds should have something to keep them going.

Baby boom

Juvenile goldfinch

I don't know why today in particular but the garden's full of baby birds: a dozen spadgers, half a dozen newly-fledged goldfinches, a couple each of young blue tits and great tits and a very young dunnock. The bird feeders have been taking a battering.

Juvenile goldfinch

There were a couple more young rooks on the school playing field. The seasons are a-changing: there were thirty-odd black-headed gulls on there this afternoon. In a couple of weeks we may also be hitting three figures.

Leighton Moss

Male chaffinch

The weather being set for July's own special brand of dreich I thought I'd take a chance of a visit to Leighton Moss. The trip up's straightforward these days and the trains are still only slightly busier than they have been. I decided that the fifteen swifts screaming over Humphrey Park Station were a good omen.

Juvenile chaffinch

The reserve was a lot quieter than usual, which made for a very pleasant walk within its limits (the path down to the Griesdale and Tim Jackson Hides is still closed). Nearly everyone was very good about giving people space to pass by on the paths and safely distanced in the hides.

The birds have obviously enjoyed the quiet Spring. The feeders by the garden were thick with finches — chaffinches, greenfinches, goldfinches and bullfinches — and tits, mostly great and blue with a couple of marsh tits. A curious thing: there's usually a bunch of robins and pheasants cadging for food off people here and both were absent.

The view from the sky tower

The sky tower's open so I decided to have a look round from up there while I had the chance, just in case Lillian's Hide was busy. There were a lot of coot, gadwall and mallard on the pool (with the usual challenge of picking out the differences between the not quite full grown ducklings of the last two). The black-headed gulls still had a couple of well-grown youngsters, which led to a bit of drama when one of the herons approached too closely and was chased off screaming by an irate parent.

Lillian's Hide was quiet so I didn't feel guilty about spending a bit of time scanning the reedbeds. A couple of dozen swifts and a handful of swallows hawked for insects over the water. A few more black-headed gulls flew in and squabbled noisily. At last, a female marsh harrier lurched out of the reedbed, circled lazily around for a couple of minutes and gently floated back down again.

I followed the one-way system down towards the stream by the visitor centre. This is where I encountered my first robin of the day. There was also a very fine goldcrest with a glowing orange crest popping in and out of the willows by the path.

The trees by the boardwalk to the public causeway are generally good for a couple of robins and a great tit or two. Today it was busy with an unusually early mixed tit flock including great tits, blue tits, a marsh tit family with a couple of youngsters and a treecreeper.

Marsh tit not posing for the camera

Walking along the causeway there were odd noises from wrens, blue tits and a reed buntings. Then, all of a sudden, three marsh harriers — a male and two juveniles — rose up and floated around low over the reeds for a minute or so. Of course they only ever do this when there's a tree and some very high reeds between you and the reedbed so you can't get any decent photos.

A great black-back steamed in a landed on the pool by the causeway. This was a prelude to what was to come when I visited the hide.

Great crested grebe
I think the monster catch is a rudd

Looking out from the hide the first birds to catch the eye were a few mute swans dotted about, a heron sitting by the hide, a distant raft of coot and half a dozen cormorants on the little island with an adult and juvenile great black-back. A few mallard were dotted about, the only ducks to be seen. There were a couple of great crested grebes, one of which swam across the pool proudly grappling with a huge fish which I think was a rudd. The grebe disappeared behind the reeds, I don't know if it had mouths to feed.

Another dozen swifts hawked over the water, joined by a small flock of sand martins. The juvenile great black-back decided to have a swim. The calm was suddenly broken by the calls of a pair of great black-backs which circled overhead calling all awhile. The young black-back quickly swam back to the safety of its very agitated parent. Their moment of mischief done, the miscreants flew off, replaced almost immediately by another pair which landed and settled on the water. The original pair returned and had a shouting match with the others, which prompted a third pair to fly in and join in the fun. After a couple of minutes of noisy posturing two of the pairs flew off.

Great black-back

Walking back along the causeway a Cetti's warbler was calling from the usual place.

I decided to move on. I'd checked the train times and at first it looked possible to max out my old man's explorer ticket with a visit to Millom, until I noticed that the only way back was either via Carlisle and the purchase of a ticket to Lancaster or else getting home in the dark. I also noticed that the trains back home from Barrow were every two hours and left five minutes before the train from Lancaster arrived, which meant mooching around in Barrow in the rain, which didn't appeal. So I decided to get the train out as far as Dalton-in-Furness and change there.

Getting the train was a good call as it started pouring down. It was high tide so there were large numbers of black-headed gulls on the salt marshes between the Kent and Leven. Just before Grange-over-Sands the train flushed a great egret which rose out of one of the little creeks, flew a little way out and disappeared into another creek. As the train crossed the Leven a raft of eiders floated upstream. The rain had eased a little on the way back, I couldn't see the eiders but I did see a herd of a dozen or more mute swans.

I'm glad I took a chance, it was a good day out.

Home thoughts

Rooks, Lostock School

It's a quiet time in the garden: there's enough wild fruit and seeds and insects about in the wild for most of the birds to only come in to top up first thing in the morning and again in the evening. The goldfinches linger longer — people with municipal strimmers always take out the thistles first — and the sessions where adult sparrows teach new spadgers where to find the feeders tend to be mid-morning. The first brood of male spadgers are already showing tiny goatee bibs.

One sad note: I found out what happened to one of the adult robins. My next-door neighbour tells me he found its remains. It had been a regular companion to his digging over his new vegetable bed. I know it's the natural scheme of things and that if I was a keen observer of mealworms I'd be shaking my fist at the robins but it's still a bit sad when it happens.

The rooks are definitely back on the school playing field though they've only got two or three youngsters with them. The jackdaws have half a dozen youngsters in tow, I always know by the noise when they're arriving for the morning.

Northwich

Juvenile dabchick, Neumann's Flash

I wanted to start going a bit further afield this week but the weather's set fair for a trip to the seaside and the hides are reopening at Leighton Moss this week so neither would be a good way to avoid the crowds. I decided to go out to Northwich to see what the flashes look like in Summer. The timing's a bit complicated as the trains are running once every two hours on the emergency timetables but it's only twenty-five minutes from Altrincham Station.

Ashton's Flash was quiet save a mixed flock of swifts and sand martins. Small family parties of goldfinches flitted about and a dozen black-headed gulls loaded about on one of the pools. Further along I could see a couple of lapwings and an oystercatcher on the smaller pool.

Walking along the bund between the flashes I spent a while making sure the chiffchaffs calling in the birches weren't willow warblers and a long while finding the great spotted woodpecker voicing its displeasure at me from a willow.

Moorhen, Neumann;s Flash

Neumann's Flash was considerably quieter than last time I visited. A few mute swans, Canada geese, coots and mallard and a pair of great crested grebes with well-grown young. Then a juvenile dabchick decided things were too quiet so it spent ten minutes swimming up and down past the hide having a good shout to keep in practice. I spotted a common sandpiper on one of the tiny islands. A little later I noticed it had a companion and I was surprised to see it was another common sandpiper, it's so rare I see more than one at a time.

Juvenile dabchick, Neumann's Flash

It was nice walking weather so I decided to have a bit of an explore into Marbury Country Park and to see how easy or not it would be to get to Budworth Mere (I was half-hoping the black-necked grebe that was there last week might make a reappearance).

I took the path across Dairy House Meadows, which turned out to be a pleasant walk. Chiffchaffs and whitethroats quietly went about their business in the trees and bushes. A pair of coot on a small pond had a very young family. A slightly larger pond was lively with common blue damselflies and brown hawkers. As I approached the path to the canal a buzzard reared up from the field and soared off over the trees.

Over the canal bridge and into the heavily wooded corner of Marbury Country Park. I was struck by how quiet it was birdwise (there were plenty of dog walkers). A couple of blackbirds quietly rummaged round in the brambles and a pair of wrens took exception to an over-enthusiatic spaniel. I was working out which path went to the mere when a great spotted woodpecker flew down to the tree I was standing by, gave me a dirty look and flew off.

A gigantic (1m wide) bracket fungus, Marbury Country Park

Budworth Mere is obviously a popular walk for young families. There were the usual suspects on the water, with the addition of an adult herring gull and a cormorant.

I took the path back that acts as the boundary between the woodland and the open parkland. Warblers were more in evidence with blackcaps and a garden warbler singing and a few chiffchaffs fly-catching from the low branches. One pair of blackcaps had a couple of fledglings in tow. Every so often one would come out into the open to be fed by the male, whizzing back under cover immediately the meal was delivered. Nuthatches had been notably absent in the woodland so it came as a relief to finally hear one as I was approaching the canal.

Male blackcap, Marbury Country Park

Back over the canal and along Marbury Lane towards Neumann's Flash. More blackcaps and chiffchaffs, song thrushes and blackbirds feeding on the paths and a rather fine male bullfinch calling from a hawthorn bush.

A reed warbler was calling from the reeds on the Western side of Neumann's Flash, eventually it popped up to have a look round and have a think about having a sing before deciding it had other things to do. I could also hear a sedge warbler calling but couldn't place it. It was only when I'd walked down the path a few yards from the hide that I realised it was sat at the top of one of the small birch trees.

The swifts and sand martins had moved on from Ashton's Flash, replaced by a small flock of house martins.

Then back to Northwich Station for a half hour wait for the train and the chance of a sit down after five hours' walking around. A good walk.

Stretford and Sale

Juvenile great-crested grebe, Sale Water Park

I thought I'd have a walk round Sale Water Park and decided to walk down via Stretford Meadows. A good call as I was no sooner at the car park by the garden centre than two ravens flew overhead. Nearly every time I see ravens flying over locally they're flying North. I've no idea where they're going or where they've been.

The meadows were a lot quieter than they have been: there were plenty of warblers, finches and buntings about but the only ones singing were a couple of reed buntings and a chiffchaff. Lots of woodpigeons flying over but only a couple feeding on the ground. No lesser whitethroats today but that's not surprising, they tend to be lurkers when not in song.

Walking down past Kickety Brook and through Stretford Ees there were a few more chiffchaffs calling, accompanied by blackcaps and song thrushes. There were small family parties of whitethroats in the open space by the cemetery.

Juvenile great-crested grebe, Sale Water Park

Sale Water Park was busy but not silly busy. The juvenile great crested grebes are full grown now and looking good. Strangely, I couldn't see the adults anywhere.

The "Teal pool" on Broad Ees Dole hosted a dozen mallard — full-grown juveniles and a couple of adult pairs, the drakes in partial eclipse with broken white collars and mottled green heads — a heron and a big red-eared terrapin, an unpleasant surprise.

Red-eared terrapin and grey heron, Broad Ees Dole

A family of mallard with very young ducklings were in the ditch in front of the hide. Out on the island there were more herons, an adult and four juveniles, and a juvenile little egret. It still feels strange having egrets within walking distance of home. More mallards, some coots and moorhens and two pairs of dabchicks. A call attracted my attention and my first kingfisher of the year shot across the water.

Grey herons and little egret, Broad Ees Dole

A jay came close to the hide to have a rummage round the brambles before disappearing into the trees.

The warmer, sunnier weather this afternoon brought out the dragonflies that have been hiding this week. Hordes of common blue damselflies danced over the water's surface and a couple of brown hawkers patrolled the ditch with jerky mechanical manœvures.

Carrying on through Sale Water Park there was a very young family of coot and a rather older family of mute swans. There were a lot more common blue damselflies and a couple more brown hawkers and my first black-tailed skimmer of the Summer.

Mosses

Walking towards Moss Lane, Glazebury

The house sparrows brought in another lot of hungry new mouths this morning. They joined the great tits and made inroads on the peanut feeder. One of the juvenile blue tits made an appearance, too. It's at that peculiar stage of moving out of juvenile plumage. I always think that the transition from juvenile to adult blue tit would involve dialling down the lemon tones and dialling up the black, and I'm always wrong: all the colour fades like a ghost first and that's the stage where it's at now.

I decided to go for a walk up Irlam Moss. It's only five minutes on the train and a short walk down to the bottom of Astley Road.

Irlam Moss was fairly quiet — only a blackcap and rather a lot of song thrushes were singing — but there were plenty of birds around. I'd been thinking that this wasn't much of a Summer for swallows but the past couple of days I've been seeing plenty of them feeding low over fields. Today they'd been favouring the freshly-mown grass being readied for cutting as turf. Other than the swallows these fields were barren of birds, the finches, warblers and titmice favouring the hedgerows, the magpies, reed buntings and yellowhammers the barley fields and the blackbirds and woodpigeons flitting between the two. A female kestrel flew over one of the farm buildings next to the road, hovered over me for a minute then flew over to see if the grass-cutting had disturbed any rodents. A buzzard soared high overhead.

Approaching the bridge over the motorway I noticed a ploughed field dotted with mistle thrushes and pied wagtails. The thrushes appeared to be a family group: two adults and five juveniles in that peculiar mottled plumage that looks like they have a touch of mildew.

Over the bridge and a couple of fields where the tractors were cutting and rolling turfs. A small flock of black-headed gulls and a few lesser black-backs followed the tractors, together with what would turn out to be the only lapwing of the day.

On this side of the motorway there was a lot more birdsong, with blackcaps, wrens and blackbirds joining in. More fields of barley and more singing yellowhammers, which made them a lot easier to find as even a male yellowhammer in breeding finery disappears into a backdrop of ripe barley. A lot more linnets around, too.

At Little Woolden Moss the blackcaps and reed buntings were in full song. In contrast the willow warblers were quietly going about their business with only the occasional brief snatch of song to show willing.

It was quite busy (these things are relative: there were fourteen people and a dog but it's only a narrow path with few passing places, one of which was being monopolised by a group of ladies having a lunch break). Consequently I was a bit fidgety and didn't linger much. I struggled to get my eye in so only saw four ringed plovers on the wet and caught a male hobby flying over. Meadow pipits were still doing their parachute drop song display but the skylarks were nearly silent: the only one I saw gave a short call before disappearing into the adjoining field of barley. A large flock of swifts hunted overhead, every so often joined by a few of the swallows from the field. A buzzard flew over, mobbed by half a dozen carrion crows.

Walking down to Moss Lane I couldn't see much except overflying swallows, linnets and woodpigeons though I could hear house sparrows and blackbirds in the barley. My suspicions that the yellow wagtails were lurking in the potato field by the poly tunnels was confirmed when one briefly flew up and immediately dove for cover. Its head looked pale and greyish but I couldn't honestly say whether it was the Channel wagtail I saw previously, a trick of the light or wishful thinking.

The Glaze Brook added a grey wagtail and a couple of juvenile goosanders to the tally.

Waiting for the bus home from the Trafford Centre I noticed what looked like a herring gull. It looked a lot dark, more like common gull grey on the wings, though that could just have been due to the flat, gloomy light. It looked a bit front-heavy, too but it could just be a big male. Then I realised there was hardly any white on the primaries, just small mirrors on the outermost ones. A yellow-legged gull! Almost but not quite an adult as there was a bit of smudginess about the primary coverts. I'm guessing a fourth-Summer but could be wrong.

All the young things

Juvenile grey heron, Sale Ees

After all that drama throughout Spring I think the only corvids that successfully nested in any of the trees down the road were the pair of magpies that used their old nest after the new one caught the attention of the carrion crows. On the school playing field I haven't seen any young crows, only a couple of young rooks and half a dozen jackdaws. The pair of crows that nested near the library look to have raised a couple of youngsters and they've been swaggering around the rooftop like slightly tatty teddy boys.

Feeding time, great tits in my garden

The blue tits have emerged from post-breeding moult and are celebrating the fact by chasing each other in and out of the crowd of sparrows on the bird feeder. One of the youngsters turned up a little afterwards. The pair of great tits are back with at least one hungry mouth tagging along with them.  Another welcome return is the song thrush that's been singing all morning.

I decided to have a wander down the Mersey this afternoon. I started at Chorlton Water Park, which was a lot quieter than last time I visited (probably a function of the weather and the shops and pubs being open).

Young cock house sparrow, Chorlton Water Park

Chorlton Water Park hosted the usuals: Canada geese, mallard and coot, a few dozen black-headed gulls, a couple each of great crested grebes and tufted ducks and half a dozen ring-necked parakeets shouting the odds from the treetops.

Barlow Tip was lively with warblers: blackcaps, chiffchaffs and whitethroats singing from the trees and flitting round the bushes and thistles in family groups. A couple of song thrushes filled in the gaps in the soundscape. There were a lot of blackbirds and goldfinches about and a female bullfinch was feeding in one of the hawthorn bushes.

Walking along the river towards Jackson's Boat the bushes on the opposite bank were busy with long-tailed tits, whitethroats and blue tits. A couple of juvenile grey wagtails fed along the bank. A large flock of sand martins hawked high overhead. A rather ghostly looking insect whizzing around a clump of ragwort was my first emerald damselfly.

Male grey wagtail in mid-moult, Jackson's Boat

A cormorant flew in at Jackson's Boat. A male grey wagtail preening on the bank was in the decidedly tatty stage of moult. The first swifts of the day turned up and a family of ring-necked parakeets made a racket in the ash trees in the pub car park.

A ring-necked parakeet busy fading into the background, Jackson's Boat

I decided to walk through Sale Ees. A flock of swallows were feeding low over the field by the river. More chiffchaffs, whitethroats, song thrushes and parakeets in the trees by the path and a couple of reed buntings singing from the flag irises along the stream where a juvenile heron was lurking.

The café was open so I decided to buy my first take-out cup of tea since early March and settle down to see what would come to the feeders. A bunch of great tits and blue tits monopolised the feeders until they were spooked by a woodpigeon that kept trying — and failing — to negotiate a tube of sunflower seeds. When the tits came back they were joined by a nuthatch and a coal tit. Eventually I finished my cup of tea and the willow tit I was hoping for arrived.

The weather turned so I took the hint and sloped off for the tram. Which turned out to be lucky as my first Southern hawker dragonfly of the year was patrolling the roadside by the station entrance.

Local patch

Juvenile dunnock

I had a post-Test Match stroll round the local patch. Lostock Park had been busy on a sunny Sunday afternoon so there wasn't much about. I expected more of the same in the old cornfields and I turned out to be a bit wrong.

Large groups of black-headed gulls soared high overhead, some intent on picking off flying ants, most drifting over towards the water treatment works along the Ship Canal. Odd lesser black-backs drifted alongside the black-headed gulls.

Greenfinch

A couple of song thrushes had a competition to see who could be the loudest. The usual chiffchaffs sang continually. In contrast the blackbirds, blackcaps, whitethroats and wrens limited themselves to short, quiet bursts of song just to put the territorial markers down. The dunnocks and robins were literally silent.

Juvenile goldfinch

Family parties of goldfinches flitted between the bushes, a dozen of them settled for an early roost in the shrubs along the old freight rail line. A family of greenfinches joined them, noisily.

A family of blackcaps — a male, two young-looking juveniles and a possible female (it quickly ducked for cover) — picked off flying ants as they landed on the gravel of the railway bed.

The first dragonflies of the month, three brown hawkers, were quartering the stands of rosebay willowherb.

The tally after an hour's mooching around:

• Black-headed Gull 116
• Blackbird 10
• Blackcap 4
• Blue Tit 1
• Carrion Crow 1
• Chiffchaff 2
• Collared Dove 2
• Dunnock 3
• Feral Pigeon 27
• Goldfinch 30
• Greenfinch 5
• House Sparrow 7
• Lesser Black-backed Gull 8
• Magpie 8
• Robin 1
• Song Thrush 3
• Swift 3
• Whitethroat 3
• Woodpigeon 21
• Wren 1