Southport

Skylark, Crossens Outer Marsh

It was more than high time I had a visit to Marshside and Crossens. It was a sunny day, the trains were behaving themselves and lunchtime found me at the bottom of Marshside Road with the remaining bits of hedges chock-a-block with starlings and spadgers.

Starlings, Marshside

The fields either side of the road were busy. Mallards, gadwalls, teal and wigeon dabbled in the wet bits while on the drier bits pairs of Canada geese nursed territories in neatly spaced out grids. With the turn of the season we were down to dozens of black-tailed godwits and lapwings, the latter including a few pairs already chasing crows and jackdaws out of territories they'll be nesting in. A few little egrets were gadding about and over in the distance towards Polly's Pool a great white egret was making itself conspicuous with its characteristic leaning bus stop long-necked stance. Skylarks and meadow pipits were in full song. I had a few goes at trying to get a picture of a meadow pipit doing its parachute drop flight song but had to admit defeat in the end.

Gadwall, Marshside

A few shovelers, tufted ducks and dabchicks were on the Junction Pool with just a handful of pintails.

Walking down towards Sandgrounders my first willow warbler of the year gave a quick snatch of song from the bushes on the sand plant before being drowned out by chiffchaffs and a robin. A Cetti's warbler sang by the gate opposite the sand plant. I've not heard one here before and I was surprised it could find enough cover for a territory given how much strimming's been going on.

There weren't the vast numbers of birds in front of Sandgrounders that there were in mid-Winter but there was plenty of variety. Redshanks, ruffs and a couple of little ringed plovers fed on the muddy islands, keeping their distance from a pair of loafing great black-backs. Mallards, pintails, teal and shovelers dabbled in the pools. Godwits and wigeon fed in the damp grass and more Canada geese stood sentry on their territories. The large breeding colony of black-headed gulls of just a few years ago seems to have disappeared.

Pintail, Marshside

Teal dabbling, Marshside

Little egret, Marshside

The roadworks are still going on on this stretch of the Marine Drive so it was a nice quiet walk down to Crossens. A couple of pairs of avocets flew into Marshside Inner Marsh, there were more on the pools on the outer marsh. There were a few family parties of pink-footed geese flying about, there were rather a lot more of them out in the long grass on the salt marsh.

Pink-footed geese, Marshside Outer Marsh

A cloud of a few hundred golden plovers flew up, wheeled around Marshside and settled down onto Crossens Inner Marsh. I think this was a prelude to moving on rather than a predator response, not even the lapwings and redshanks joined them in taking flight.

The change in season was marked on Crossens Outer Marsh. There were plenty of meadow pipits and skylarks but all in pairs, not flocks. Pairs of shelducks were dotted about the smaller pools and hollows. The only wigeons and teal were on The Sluice, and just a couple of dozen at that. There were a few dozen pink-feet feeding on the grazing, the younger birds looking dark compared to the frosty-fringed adults. A flash of orange beak in the sunlight amongst a bunch of geese in the mid-distance got my hopes up but turned out to be a pair of greylags.

Pink-footed geese, Crossens Outer Marsh

Sheldrake, Crossens Outer Marsh

The regular snow goose and Todd's Canada goose had been reported from Banks Marsh. Looking at the details and seeing how far out in the marsh the snow goose had been seen I reckoned that I had as much chance of seeing it from the wildfowlers' pull-in on Crossens Marsh as I would from Banks. There were white shapes amongst the hundreds of geese far out on the marsh and I had to fight the heat haze to make out what they were: shelducks and little egrets and the strong light bouncing off the chests of Canada geese and the backsides of pink-feet. Much to my surprise I found the Todd's Canada goose, its pencil neck giving it and oddly angular appearance at this distance.

Crossens Outer Marsh

I had a bit of a wander into Banks but the change of angle didn't help me spot the snow goose. No matter, it had been a very agreeable walk, there had been plenty to see and the pair of little ringed plovers had brought the year list to a frankly astonishing 150.