Merseyside

House martin, Leasowe Beach

For me the August Bank Holiday weekend heralds the proper start of Autumn migration. There have been Summer migrants drifting away from their breeding grounds for a few weeks and the first returning waders arrived in the middle of last month but they're overture and beginners giving hints of the main event. Autumn migration, unlike Spring, is a drawn-out, leisurely affair. For most species there's no great urgency to get to Winter quarters and plenty of incentive to fatten up before taking on the long haul leg of the migration. Add to that a large number of inexperienced young birds which can take the wrong turning somewhere along the way and almost anything can be anywhere. It's exciting and it's unpredictable — you'll see chiffchaffs, willow warblers and swallows but beyond that you get what you get, which adds to the joy of the thing.

It was looking to be a bright, sunny day so I decided on a wander on the Wirral. I got an old man's explorer ticket to get me to Liverpool with an eye to having a diversion or two on the way back. The train into Manchester was busy with people going to Old Trafford for the test match, the trains coming back were busy with people going home from the Liverpool game but aside from that the travelling was fine.

Wheatears, Kerr's Field

I got the train to Moreton and walked down to Kerr's Field. The air was full of the twitterings of flocks of goldfinches and swallows and the clattering about of woodpigeons in the trees. I could hear but not see dunnocks in the hedges and a moorhen somewhere in the flag irises choking The Birkett. Gulls flew about overhead, roughly equal numbers of black-headed, herring and lesser black-backs.

I don't know what it is about the end paddock that makes it such a magnet for passage migrants. The first quick glance found me a male wheatear standing proud in the short grass. He wasn't alone: scanning round I found a few more further along. I spent a few minutes looking about to see what else there was but aside from a few magpies, carrion crows and woodpigeons I had to make do with a handful of wheatears, which is like making do with a box of chocolates when you weren't sure you were getting any sweeties at all.

Carrion crow, Leasowe Lighthouse

I didn't have high hopes of seeing much in the long grass by the road save for the crows and starlings that were flitting about and the swallows hawking low over the ground. The brief view of a yellow wagtail as it emerged from a patch of nettles and submerged into a sea of knotweed was a bonus.

Buzzard, Leasowe Common

I walked across Leasowe Common along the path in the trees, scanning the paddocks beyond along the way. The chiffchaffs were noisy, I could hear some of them calling as I approached from the lighthouse, the willow warblers I found were silent. They were the only warblers I found here today. The pond was reduced to a small puddle of damp mud and moorhen footprints.

Oystercatchers, Leasowe Beach

It had just passed high tide when I joined the abutment. Lines of gulls and oystercatchers stretched across the emerging mud banks. The path was busy with walkers and cyclists so there weren't many birds close by.

House martin, Leasowe Beach

Just before I got to the groyne a couple of young house martins flew in and started fluttering about the dried seaweed on the concrete slope. At first I thought they were after flies but they landed and started pecking at the seaweed itself. Dried seaweed is highly mineralised so it could be that this is some type of dietary supplement, I don't know. It was nice to finally get some photos of house martins, they aren't given to perching on telegraph wires and they are very skittish when they're collecting mud for their nests. I always forget they have knickerbockers.

Wheatear, Meols Beach

There were families fossicking round on the groyne so there were no waders on there. A wheatear was massively unconcerned by shouting kids.

Redshanks, Meols Beach

Greenshank and redshanks, Meols Beach

As always there was a change when I passed the groyne. Flocks of redshanks peppered the puddles and more flew in as the tide ebbed. There were a couple of small groups of little egrets more intent on squabbling with each other than feeding. There was just the one greenshank with the redshanks. I can't remember the last time I saw multiple greenshanks. They're sociable enough, they seem to enjoy the company of redshanks and turnstones, just not other greenshanks. There were a few curlews further out, together with hundreds more oystercatchers and gulls. This time of year shelducks are notable by their absence, they're all still in their moulting flocks elsewhere.

I didn't much fancy walking on down to Hoylake or West Kirby today so called it quits at Meols. I decided on a side-trip to Crosby Marine Park for a change of coastal scenery.

The marine lake was predictably busy with people though this didn't much faze the mute swans and herring gulls on the boating pool, they just see more opportunities for a free meal. The mallards and coots dozed in the sun and a couple of pairs of tufted ducks fed at the deep end. Any meadow pipits or skylarks were keeping their heads down but a flock of a couple of dozen linnets skittered around the sand dunes. The little egrets kept to the far end of the marine lake where the dunes are too steep for people to easily get to the water's edge.

Crosby Beach 

A sunny bank holiday Saturday on the beach didn't stop there being a thin line of dunlins and knots on the tideline. Black-headed gulls and carrion crows foraged around the families, herring gulls and lesser black-backs loafed on the sandbanks. A handful of Sandwich terns flew up the estuary.

I had a wander along the fence looking into Seaforth Nature Reserve. A flock of a couple of hundred starlings split their time between the blackberries twining their way through the gorse patches and the rabbit-cropped turf. Most of the noise was provided by common terns, mostly youngsters, on the pool with a few Sandwich terns and black-headed gulls providing backing vocals. Although the tide had retreated there were still plenty of oystercatchers and black-tailed godwits with the lapwings and Canada geese on the islands and redshanks and dunlins flew to and fro. 

I saw a flash of red and brown as I was walking down to Waterloo Station and found this red underwing moth on a garage door.

I'd done a full circuit and headed back to Waterloo for the train. I debated whether to go up to Southport and get a train home from there or go to Liverpool, in the end deciding to leave it to fate and the first train that turned up. Which was a mistake: the train was Saturday teatime busy as it was then at Sandhills we got the football fans going home from Anfield. The Manchester train from Hunts Cross was just as busy, it was only once we'd passed Widnes there was any sitting room. Shockingly bad timing on my part! Still, I'd had a good day's birdwatching and a couple of decent walks in the fine weather so I had nothing to complain about.

Meols