Blackleach Country Park

Canada goose flying over for a fight, Blackleach Country Park 

Now that I've removed half the rambling rose from the back garden I've got a better idea of why the fat balls are disappearing at a tidy rate. I've been assuming that the spadgers have been coming in a dozen at a time, they've actually been coming in two dozen at a time. The great tits and long-tailed tits are coming in one at a time which suggests they're on a nesting rota, unlike the blue tits which are travelling in threes at the moment. The singing male chaffinch has been joined at the feeders by a female, which bodes well. A chiffchaff has visited a few times but is probably just passing through. The blackcap that had been singing at the railway station seems to have moved on.

The blackbirds start their dawn chorus just after four in the morning, joined an hour later by a carrion crow and a couple of woodpigeons, the robin and collared dove don't kick in until daybreak. In between time flocks of gulls pass overhead each morning. I've no idea how many birds are involved but most mornings I'll hear lesser black-backs calling, less often I'll be able to pick out a herring gull passing by. Yesterday a flock of black-headed gulls flew North and twice this week I've heard a Mediterranean gull. It's frustrating not being able to see them, I don't know if it's ones and twos of birds or whole squadrons. 

I spent the whole morning havering about whether/where to go for a walk on a bright and breezy day. I was set to spend the afternoon doing the same so I dragged myself out by the scruff of the neck and headed for the year's first visit to Blackleach Country Park. It will surprise the reader not one bit to find the clouds rolled over and the bus had hardly got as far as Eccles when it started pouring down. I got the 22 from the Trafford Centre into Kearsley, got off at Melville Road and walked down through the little industrial estate on Lyon Road and over the motorway bridge into the country park. I have to say, intimidating though it looked at first sight it's a much better route than the footpath I've used whenever I've come up this way to catch the 22 after a visit to the park.

Treecreeper, Blackleach Country Park 

The trees by the motorway were buzzing with small birds, mostly blue tits working their way through the insects visiting the willow catkins. Pairs of great tits and dunnocks bounced about the undergrowth, robins and wrens and a chiffchaff sang and blackbirds skittered about the paths. A couple of treecreepers showed well, the coal tits and long-tailed tits needed looking for.

Walking through the woods

Approaching the lake

Walking towards the lake there were clouds of — mercifully! — non-biting midges. When I got to the lake it became apparent there was a mass emergence going on, dozens of black-headed gulls and coots were sitting on the water snapping up midges as they took to the air. As the wind blew the heavy clouds away awhile the sun came out the birds got busier.

Coot, Blackleach Country Park 

Coot, Blackleach Country Park 

A pair of great crested grebes lurked about the reed fringes where a reed bunting was singing lustily. The first ducks I noticed were a pair of gadwall, there were a dozen or so each of mallards and tufted ducks over on the other side. A couple of dozen black-headed gulls clamoured for scraps over by the jetty where a family was feeding a few Canada geese. I noticed that a couple of last year's mute swan cygnets hadn't been chased away by their parents.

Mallard, Blackleach Country Park 

Although there were Canada geese and mallards loafing on some of the rafts nothing yet looked to be nesting. A couple of cormorants, a juvenile and an adult carbo male with fine white quills in his head feathers dozed in the sun. (I could tell it was the nominate carbo subspecies because the yellow throat pouch had a roughly square shape against the white of the throat; it's an acute angle in the continental sinensis subspecies. We get both in this country, sinensis tending to stay inland.)

Scrapping Canada geese, Blackleach Country Park 

A couple of pairs of Canada geese decided to have a fight, one pair flying over special for it. There was a lot of aggressive hissing with their tongues fully extended and a couple indulged in a spot of neck wrestling before they settled down into passively aggressively cruising round each other.

Blackleach Country Park 

I completed the walk round the lake, bumping into the goldfinches, greenfinches and chaffinches in the open parkland that were notably absent in the woods, then got the 37 bus into Manchester and thence home.

Barton Clough 

It had become a sunny teatime so I stopped off for half an hour's wander round my local patch as the birds started to settle down to roost or sing in the bedtime chorus.

• Black-headed Gull 3 overhead 
• Blackbird 8
• Blue Tit 3
• Carrion Crow 3
• Chaffinch 2
• Chiffchaff 1
• Dunnock 2
• Goldcrest 1
• Goldfinch 4
• Great Tit 5
• Greenfinch 8
• House Sparrow 4
• Lesser Black-backed Gull 4 overhead
• Magpie 10
• Mistle Thrush 1
• Robin 4
• Song Thrush 1
• Starling 3
• Woodpigeon 49
• Wren 4

Lostock Park