Horwich

Meadow pipit

A cooler, cloudier day today so I decided to take a walk up onto the Horwich Moors, partly to have a walk through completely different country to that I've been traipsing through this year, partly because there had been reports of crossbills in the conifer plantations, and partly because it's been months since I've seen the sea (the ambiguous change in the blue-grey in the far distance as you look out from the Rivington Pike Snack Shack is the Sefton coast and the Ribble Estuary).

I got the 125 bus to Bottom O'Th'Moor and walked up George's Lane. I hadn't walked far before the songs of chiffchaff, song thrush and robin were joined by a willow warbler singing from the copse across the road. A little further on and a blackcap was singing from behind one of the houses.

Along George's Lane

The weather forecast had promised some sunshine by lunchtime and there were odd bits of promise of it as the brisk wind blew the occasional hole in the clouds. The top of the television mast on Winter Hill was always out of view and the low cloud hid a flock of pink-footed geese flying overhead.

Meadow pipit

There were plenty of meadow pipits around, including one flitting about the Snack Shack that looked and sounded perfectly normal in flight but showed a conspicuous white flash on its head when it landed. 

A view from Rivington Pike
(Wales is over there somewhere)

I had a cup of coffee and had a look at the seaside. Rather a lot closer a couple of pairs of lapwings were fussing round while a pair of magpies fossicked about in the sheep droppings.

The wind picked up as I walked up towards the tower. This didn't bother the meadow pipits and a couple of skylarks overmuch but the pine trees were very quiet save for the odd mutterings of chaffinches and coal tits deep under cover. 

Rivington Pike

I wandered up a bit further, venturing into modern Lancashire and enjoying the views. On my way back down an unfamiliar chunky-looking finch flew down and into the little pine plantation by the Snack Shack (where I didn't see a wryneck last Autumn). I wasted a few minutes trying to get a good enough signal on my 'phone for me to try and identify the flight call on Xeno-canto. I gave up and put it down as a mystery and carried on down the path. Just as I got to the plantation twelve crossbills flew out and over to the pines up near the tower. I'd like to think I recognised them by their flight calls but in truth I only identified them by the four rather fine rusty red males in the flock.

Female stonechat

Male stonechat

I'd been looking out for stonechats because I remembered watching a male feeding some well grown youngsters here last Autumn. I almost missed them: I was looking a some young lambs in a field when a female pounced on something in the grass in front of them and retreated empty handed to the barbed wire fence on the field margin. A few minutes later the male turned up and showed off a bit.

Old Rake's Way, Wilderswood

I didn't want to retrace my steps all the way down to Chorley Old Road so I took a detour into Wilderswood. Bolton Council had put notices up warning of felling work this month, they need to fell a lot of the larches and pines due to disease. It didn't take long for me to see what they meant: a lot of the larches were in a very bad way indeed. 

Wilderswood

I heard a green woodpecker yaffling (typical: you wait years for a green woodpecker and get two in as many days). A hefty female sparrowhawk flushed a flock of ten crossbills out of the trees and they flew off towards George's Lane. I identified them by their call and their shape this time, helped considerably by there being at least a couple of males in the flock to confirm my first impressions.

I followed the path down to Brownlow Road then took the footpath over to Factory Hill and walked down to Bridge Street Local Nature Reserve. This is a small stretch (seven acres) of broadleaf woodland with a fast stream running through it. It's a nice little walk and I was rewarded for it with a pair of grey wagtails skittishly foraging along the water's edge.

It was a couple of minutes' walk from here to the bus stop on Chorley Old Road and off home. After yesterday and today my knees have asked if I could stick to the flat for a few days.