Woodland walk

Mallard, Old Warke Dam

It was a fairly grey and gloomy November day and I really wasn't sure what I wanted to do with it. In the end I drifted over for a nosy round the local patch to see if that suggested anything.

Barton Clough

The park was fairly quiet, save for the magpies (I'd remembered to bring a bag of food this time). When I got there I thought that at last the Winter thrushes had arrived but it was just a couple of blackbirds being a bit overdramatic. I didn't bump into any robins or mixed tit flocks today but I didn't give the park the same effort this time. There wasn't a tit flock on the old cornfield either come to that, but there was consolation with a male bullfinch calling in the apple tree and a male chaffinch rummaging round in the oleaster bushes. And it was nice to see one of the rabbits again, it's been a while.

• Black-headed Gull 5 overhead
• Blackbird 10
• Blue Tit 2
• Bullfinch 1
• Carrion Crow 4
• Chaffinch 1
• Common Gull 5 overhead
• Feral Pigeon 15 overhead
• Goldfinch 20
• Great Tit 1
• Greenfinch 2
• Herring Gull 2 overhead
• Magpie 21
• Woodpigeon 2
• Wren 1

I went over to the Trafford Centre and got a bus into Monton and had a walk through to Worsley via the Roe Green Loopline and Worsley Woods.

Duke's Drive

As I set off from Duke's Drive I bumped into a big mixed tit flock in the trees by the path. I watched a dozen long-tailed tits bounce around in the tree tops with a similar number of blue tits, a couple of pairs of great tits and at least a couple of coal tits, with a nuthatch and some goldfinches in tow, walked a few yards down in the company of a couple of robins and a wren and there were another dozen long-tailed tits with some blue tits. It some became apparent that this was one flock moving down the path. I lost sight of them when they reached a patch of beech trees that were still carrying their leaves.

Grey squirrel, Duke's Drive

There were plenty of magpies bouncing round and there were more on the golf course beyond the trees on my right, together with at least three ring-necked parakeets. There was a sufficiency of squirrels about, too.

Roe Green Loopline information board on the platform of the old Worsley Station

Approaching Sindsley Brook there was another mixed tit flock, fair-sized but not quite as big as the one at the start of the walk. It struck me how few chaffinches there were given this was a walk through a beech wood. I didn't see much evidence of beech mast, either.

Through the tunnel under Worsley Road

There was more of the same, though fewer in number, once I passed through the tunnel under Worsley Road. I took the turning up the bank and over to Old Warke Dam.

Old Warke Dam

A jay by the old aviary easily out-shouted the mallards on the pond at Old Warke Dam despite their being joined by two big white domestic ducks. A pair of mute swans grunted at me then resumed feeding, the Canada geese couldn't be bothered even registering my presence. 

Tufted duck, Old Warke Dam

Female teal, Old Warke Dam

There was a handful of tufted ducks, all males for some reason. Anywhere I bump into tufted ducks and coots feeding together I'll look for gadwall and sure enough there were a couple of pairs over by the far bank. A dozen teal dozing deep under the willows by the near bank were easy to overlook.

Canada geese, Old Warke Dam

I took the short route through Worsley Woods over to Worsley Green. There were a few robins, dunnocks and wrens about the paths and a nuthatch foraging in one of the ash trees but the songscape was entirely ring-necked parakeets.

I headed for the bus stop on Barton Road, taking the little path that passes by the Packet House. The usual mallards were on the canal, less usual was the kingfisher that shot past from the Delph. How on earth a kingfisher manages to fish in the rust-brown soup that is this stretch of the Bridgewater Canal is beyond me.

Bridgewater Canal, Worsley