Trafford Park

Great crested grebes, Manchester Ship Canal, Barton

A cold night followed by a bright sunny day which would have been lovely if the wind didn't have that edge to it so the garden was fairly busy. The blue tits stayed all day while the spadgers did the rounds, to-ing and fro-ing in small groups and turning up mob-handed late in the morning as usual. The blackcap was back having a couple of visits to the fat feeders again. Three goldfinches were a nice change, they don't come in often enough these days.

• Black-headed Gull 1 overhead
• Blackbird 2
• Blackcap 1
• Blue Tit 3
• Carrion Crow 1
• Collared Dove 1
• Dunnock 2
• Goldfinch 3
• Great Tit 2
• House Sparrow 21
• Magpie 1
• Rook 3
• Long-tailed Tit 2
• Robin 1
• Starling 11
• Woodpigeon 1

Had a lunchtime stroll round the local patch which was fairly quiet except for the magpies which are congregating in their pre-breeding groups like so many boisterous teenyboppers. I was dropping down the steps to St. Modwens Road when the buzzard turned up, flying in from the Trafford Centre and being swiftly mobbed back again by a pair of carrion crows.

Bridgewater Canal approaching Barton Aquaduct

I decided to have a wander along the canal through Trafford Park to Barton. The canal was frozen over so there wasn't much in the way of waterbirds — three Canada geese on the towpath and a moorhen that had found a tea tray sized patch of open water amidst the roots of a canalside willow.

Small numbers of gulls — lesser black-backs, black-headed gulls and herring gulls — loafed on factory roofs or drifted overhead in one's or twos. Pairs of crows and magpies made a racket in the trees by the towpath but none seemed to be working on nests yet. As I approached the bridge for Parkway another pair of carrion crows harassed another buzzard (this was the one that's often perched in the trees by the tram lines) and a jay sat at head height ten feet from me and watched me walk by (I had to look three times: a jay sitting still that close to me and doing it quietly is a bit unusual).

I got to Barton Aquaduct and climbed up onto the platform over the canal. The Bridgewater Canal was frozen but the Ship Canal was clear of ice. A pair of great crested grebes cosied up to each other, a cormorant fished in mid-water and a couple of dozen mallard loafed and quacked by the far bank. A very striking sinsensis cormorant flew overhead — its huge white thigh patch caught my eye first, its nearly entirely white head almost disappeared into the clouds in the sky. A lot of angry croaking heralded a carrion crow come in to harass a sparrowhawk soaring over from Trafford Park, another crow flew in from Barton and the trio circled on and off into the distance.

Mallards, Manchester Ship Canal, Barton

I walked past the church and down Old Barton Road along the Ship Canal. A flock of fifty or so black-headed gulls congregated with a few dozen Canada geese on the banks of Langland Waterside on the opposite bank. Scanning through the crowds I found a couple each of common gull and herring gull and half a dozen lesser black-backs flew over. A couple turned up with a dog and some bird seed, which brought a dozen mallard and a mute swan to the party. I'd hoped to bump into a reed bunting or two in the scrub (I've had no luck with reed buntings this year). There were plenty of goldfinches and spadgers but no buntings.

Bullfinch. Barton Embankment

I walked down Barton Embankment and onto Trafford Way. A male bullfinch fed on hawthorn buds and a family of long-tailed tits bounced through the trees by the big development plot on the corner. I looked to see if either of the peregrines was on the roof of Beyond or on any of the telegraph pylons but the only birds about there were pigeons and jackdaws.

I walked down to the Trafford Centre and thence home. Pigeons, woodpigeons and black-headed gulls all the way. Back home to find the long-tailed tits and great tits on the feeders and the blackcap in for a late afternoon top-up.