Lazy day

River Kent, Arnside

It was a miserable start to the day and the weather forecast wasn't offering a lot better. The bird feeders were empty again — the spadgers are demolishing half a dozen fat balls a day with the help of a couple of magpies and a starling — and while I was putting more food out I pondered today's options. The weather tidied itself up again by ten o'clock but I felt the dampness of my boots still drying by the radiator and the ache in my joints and decided I'd have a lazy day of it.

I'd read yesterday's bird reports in the search for inspiration and saw the latest about the penduline tit. It looks like yesterday's misgivings were right: there's no access for non-permit holders today and permit holders have been told to stick to the path and not go on the mud bank. I don't think this episode bodes well for access to any future rarities here.

I got myself an old man's explorer ticket and set off on the Barrow train. The aim was to see what was about on the salt marshes of South Cumbria and see what waterfowl were about on the River Leven.

The bare trees along the trackside made it tons easier to see what birdlife was about. Plenty of magpies, carrion crows and jackdaws about but woodpigeons were still thin on the ground. Beyond Wigan small groups of black-headed gulls danced for worms in fields or billowed about in the wind and rain.

The tide was high at Hest Bank, the tide and the recent rain had the marshes between Carnforth and Silverdale awash. The pools at the coastal hides were more than overflowing but only a few dozen shelducks and wigeon were taking advantage. A marsh harrier floated over the fields by the level crossing and a buzzard flew low over the train as we approached Silverdale Station. I don't often see buzzards flying that low round here, the harriers tend to take exception.

As we crossed the Kent at Arnside it was apparent that it was a very high tide being whipped up by the wind in the filthy weather. The salt marshes of the South Cumbrian coast merged into the sea with just a few grassy mounds suggesting land. The marshes were liberally peppered with carrion crows, black-headed gulls and little egrets with seventeen egrets lurking by Kent's Bank station. As we headed inland towards Cark the train spooked a flock of fieldfares that had been settled in the trackside hedgerow.

The water covered nearly all the marsh by the Leven Estuary, the only way to tell which was marsh and which was estuary was the presence or not of telegraph poles. A few mallards dabbled on the water while curlews and redshanks flew by. 

I arrived at Barrow and after checking the trains and the weather I decided not to move on any further. I had a bit of a potter round Barrow then got the next train back to Manchester.

I sat on the landward side on the way back to see what I might have missed on the way up. Small flocks of herring gulls and black-headed gulls danced for worms in the stubble fields while jackdaws and carrion crows strutted amongst the sheep. The tide was just on the ebb as we went over the Leven, a flock of wigeons were already settling on the emerging banks and a red-breasted merganser swam along the channel by the viaduct. There was another merganser on the Kent at Arnside. 

The fields between Grange-over-Sands and Silverdale were extensively flooded, the golf course at Grange looked more like the salt marsh and had rather more mallards on it. Just outside Arnside a great white egret hunted knee-deep in a flooded stubble field while a heron was trying its luck on the golf course at Silverdale. A flock of little egrets kept to the high ground of the junction just outside Carnforth Station.

The rest of the ride was pretty uneventful, which makes a nice change. I'd seen plenty of both birds and scenery in an entirely passive sort of way and kept nice and dry in the process. There's a lot to be said for these changes of pace.