Urban birding: Manchester

Canada geese, Alexandra Park 

A cold and frosty morning meant a gull-less school playing field but quite a busy back garden. I refilled all the feeders, just as well as the fat balls that were left overnight were rock hard in the cold and the spadgers were making heavy weather of them. The geopolitical situation has put sunflower hearts out of my price bracket so the birds will have to make do with black sunflower seeds, not that I'm hearing any complaints. I also put out what felt like half a hundredweight of mealworms, the starlings make short work of them. I did a bit of work in the garden — there's a lot needing doing — and received the very vocal disapproval of the blackbirds and spadgers. The robins and dunnocks were happy enough once they realised I was grubbing up some brambles the blackbirds had sown amongst the roses.

I had to go into town for an errand and bumped into the coal tits at the station, I'd worried that I hadn't seen them in the garden. It turns out they were preoccupied with their billing and cooing. As, indeed, are the local collared doves and mistle thrushes.

I decided on a diversion on the way back so got the 103 into Moss Side and had a stroll around Alexandra Park. I didn't have my camera with me so of course the grass was littered with very confiding redwings. Mind you, they might not have been taking any notice of people but it might have been different if somebody was pointing a telephoto lens at them. Parakeets screeched as they chased each other round the treetops with backing vocals from robins, magpies and carrion crows. The crowd of black-headed gulls by the play area made up for the ones missing from the school field. The lake was busy with waterfowl, for once the tufted ducks more than outnumbered both the mallards and Canada geese. I had a giddy moment and checked to make sure there wasn't a ring-necked duck amongst them. I did find a pair of shovelers dozing under the bank of the island, though. It's a bit early yet for the herons to be coming in to breed.

It had been a pleasant and undemanding half hour's stroll on a surprisingly pleasant, if grey, Winter's afternoon.