Southport

Spoonbill, Crossens Inner Marsh

A windswept and interesting few hours walking round Marshside and Crossens Marsh. The weather didn't bode well for a walk down Marine Drive to Marshside so I got the 44 bus and, instead of getting off at the bottom of Marshside Road I stayed on a couple of stops and walked down the cut besides the school and walked down the bund to the coastal road. 

Avocet, Marshside

The back end of the marsh by the bund can be quite good for waders but today they kept out of the wind, save for a couple of dozen black-tailed godwits and the avocets. There were good numbers of avocets scattered round Marshside and Crossens, perhaps fifty birds, I wonder how many will stay to nest. Pairs of shovelers lurked in small pools and ditches around the marshes. No sign of any wigeon or pintail, their numbers replaced by swallows, house martins and swifts.

I'd come on a wild goose chase but save for the usual greylags and Canada geese it was thin pickings. Crossens Outer Marsh was littered with shelducks and black-headed gulls but no sign of pink-footed geese, they've flown North in search of more celement weather. There were a few stragglers, mostly young birds, on Crossens Inner. There were at least a dozen little egrets floating around, mostly single birds.

Little egret, Crossens Inner Marsh

There had been a spoonbill reported on Polly's Pool over the weekend so I kept an eye out to see if it was still about. Polly's Pool had been full of Canada geese and black-headed gulls but no spoonbill. Generally speaking, if you're looking for a spoonbill you're looking for something like a discarded flock mattress on a pole (they're notoriously sleepy) and ninety nine times out of a hundred you'll have found a discarded flock mattress. Generally speaking. Today, a very awake, very lively spoonbill was feeding in one of the ditches easily visible from the coastal road.

Spoonbill, Crossens Inner Marsh

Spoonbill, Crossens Inner Marsh

Spoonbill, Crossens Inner Marsh

Spoonbill, Crossens Inner Marsh

Spoonbill, Crossens Inner Marsh

Spoonbill, Crossens Inner Marsh

Spoonbill, Crossens Inner Marsh

Walking down into Marshside I could see more little egrets with the tufted ducks and shovelers in the ditches. I disturbed a common sandpiper which flew over and disappeared behind a bank. I tried to pick it up again and found a couple of lapwing chicks.

I was accompanied along the roadside by small flocks of linnets and goldfinches and a couple of sedge warblers and a whitethroat sang from the cover of the brambles.

There wasn't a lot happening at Sandgrounders. The black-headed gull colony looks smaller than usual. A few black-tailed godwits and pied wagtails fed by the water's edge. A few redshanks and oystercatchers fed noisily in the grass.

I decided to walk up Marshside Road and have the wind at my back for a change. It turned out to be a good call: the waders I hadn't been seeing from the bund were all on the flooded field by the road.

Redshanks, oystercatchers and lapwings caught my eye first then I found a dozen dunlin roosting on a mud bank. A little further along I got a distant view of a wood sandpiper (up to seven were reported over the weekend) and a couple of ruff, including a male with a black and white ruff.

A little further along I could see a flock of dunlin feeding about fifty yards out from the road. While I was scanning them I noticed a couple of ringed plover feeding on the mud behind them. When I came back to the dunlins I realised that a couple of them were a bit different. They were taller, rustier and had longer, curved bills. They were a couple of curlew sandpipers.

Curlew sandpipers (second and third right) and dunlins, Marshside

As I approached the school there were a few more ruffs, a few more dunlins, and a few teal. I pushed my luck by having a look for any cattle egrets amongst the cattle, it's a bit early in the year for them so I wasn't surprised not to see any.

Ruff (reeve), Marshside

It had been a good three and a bit hours' birdwatching. I'd gone for geese and come back with an abundance of waders and a spoonbill. You can plan all you want but you get what you get.