Barrow

Red-necked grebe

The plan was to have a bit of a dawdly sort of a day at Leighton Moss. The plan was. On the way I noticed a report of a red-necked grebe at Cavendish Dock in Barrow and seeing as I was already on the Barrow train and red-necked grebe is the only grebe on the British List I've not seen this century and seeing as my old man's explorer ticket was good for any Northern Rail train between Carlisle and Stoke, I thought: why not?

The little egrets of Morecambe Bay were out in full force today with scarcely a stretch of salt marsh without a few amongst the carrion crows and shelducks.

I got off at Roose and walked down Rampside Road. Google Maps told me there was a road between Rampside Road and Cavendish Dock. Not for the first time Google Maps wanted me to climb the gates into a sewage works. Luckily there was a not unduly muddy path from the end of Old Rampside Road that went over the hill and joined the greenway that runs by the side of the dock and joins the causeway.

The walk along the greenway was nice, even in today's moody weather. I'll have to find out where it starts. A song thrush was doing its best to drown out robins, dunnocks and goldfinches. Furtive movements in the bushes involved coal tits, bullfinches and goldcrests.

Cavendish Dock

It was a first time visit to Cavendish Dock, I usually only see it as the train goes past into Barrow, so I didn't know what to expect. Turns out that the lake is as big and open as it looks on the map, there's an excellent path with some sheltered seating along the causeway and there's an expanse of saltmarsh on the seaward side. The tide was rolling in when I arrived, which gave excellent opportunities for wader watching.

Salt marsh by Cavendish Dock

The most obvious birds on the dock were the rafts of black-headed gulls and herring gulls loafing on the water and the dozen cormorants drying their wings on a jetty. Once I got my eye in I could find a few mute swans and a male goosander by the corner nearest Roose and a couple of pairs of red-breasted mergansers out beyond the jetty. No sign of any grebes of any sort but nil desp, there was a long length of causeway to walk yet.

Redshank

Out on the salt marsh the curlews and redshanks being noisily herded together onto mudbanks by the tide were very conspicuous. Forty-odd lapwings were very self-effacing until they were forced to take flight and abandon their mud. I almost missed the couple of dozen dunlins, a few dozen knots and half a dozen ringed plovers that hung on to a stretch of samphire-covered mud till grim death.

Red-breasted merganser

I was two thirds of the way across the causeway and still hadn't seen any grebes so I sat down on one of the seats and scanned round. I added a great black-back, a couple of lesser black-backs and some common gulls to the tally, together with another couple of mergansers. Small flocks of redshanks and lapwings flew over the causeway as they retreated inland from the tide. A flock of a couple of dozen grey plovers flew in low from the sea and headed for the other side of Barrow. 

After a chat with a chap taking his dog for a walk on his mobile scooter and wishing him luck with his allotment and his Alzheimer's (I have a "Tell me your life" sort of face) I decided to move on.

I hadn't gone ten yards when a paler than usual first-Winter herring gull flew low over the incoming tide. Except it wasn't a paler than usual first-Winter herring gull. I've never seen an Iceland gull that close before, they're nearly always distantly hiding in a crowd. The best way for me to describe it is as looking like a small female herring gull with sandy brown and white plumage and with all the wing feathers the same colours as its body and back. Very neat. So if I wasn't going to get to see a red-necked grebe today the day wasn't a disappointment.

I was nearly at the end of the causeway when a chap walked up and asked: "Are you here to see that bird?" "The red-necked grebe?" I asked, "Yes, but I've had no luck." "It's just there, it was the first thing I saw," he answered.

And bugger me, so it was.

Red-necked grebe

It was feeding close to the causeway, I couldn't see it from the seat because it was hidden by the curve of the bank and I was looking too far out while I was walking along. I thanked the chap profusely and as he asked why it was a red-necked grebe I talked him through the identification: the more stocky build and thicker, darker neck; the thick yellowish bill; and the shorter, more rounded crest. A very nice looking bird and I hope I don't have to wait so long for my next one!

Red-necked grebe

Red-necked grebe

I walked down the road between Ramsden Dock and Cavendish Dock. Oystercatchers and lapwings loafed on the sides of Ramsden Dock and a couple of pairs of eiders swam by a little island. A male stonechat flew down from the fence into some dead thistles. 

Eiders and herring gull

I walked into Barrow and seeing as we were in that peculiar period where all trains head North I got the Carlisle train as far as Seascale and the next train back from Barrow from there. A raven being escorted out of a pine grove was the only addition to the day list but the journey's worth it for the scenery alone, even on a dreich day.

Ravensglass

Barrow train to Lancaster for the train to Manchester (the first time this connection's possible after mid-afternoon). A very productive day's birdwatching even if it wasn't the one I left home to have.