Pennington Flash

Stock dove

After about a week of seeing in the dawn before getting to sleep I crash-slept last night and woke up feeling like I could sleep for days. It took me a while to recover my wits but I didn't want to waste a relatively decent day once the rain had finished even though all I was fit for was a bit of pottering around. I went to the bus stop and decided that if the 256 arrived first I'd have a wander round Wellacre Country Park, if the 25 then I'd have that walk round Pennington Flash I chickened out of the other day.

So I went to Pennington Flash.

Pennington Flash 

It was a cloudy day and a bit cool for July, which honestly quite suited me. I hadn't realised quite how windy it was until I got to the car park. All the mallards, a few Canada geese and two Muscovy ducks were battened down on the bank at the side of the car park with a couple of dozen black-headed gulls, all the mute swans and the rest of the Canada geese lined the opposite shore in the lee of the trees. Riding the choppy waves were rafts of coots and black-headed gulls, a few lesser black-backs and a handful of herring gulls and a raft of a couple of dozen great crested grebes including a couple of near fully grown youngsters.

The conditions seemed ideal for swifts and hirundines. More than fifty swifts wheeled about, a similar number of sand martins hawked low over the flash and a flock of a few dozen house martins higher up. It took me a while to spot any swallows, they were over by the sailing club and it was only when they started drifting nearer I could recognise them. Half a dozen common terns bounced in the wind over the water though it was a passing arctic tern I noticed first. There was at least one juvenile common tern, I wasn't sure if I kept seeing the same one blowing back in the wind.

From the Horrocks Hide 

There wasn't a lot on the spit at the Horrocks Hide, just a couple of lapwings close to and a dozen Canada geese at the end. A couple of great crested grebes and a coot were still sitting on nests next to the black-headed gulls' raft in the bight.

The first warbler I heard today was a garden warbler, of all things, singing by Pengy's pool as I walked down to the Tom Edmondson Hide. I had the usual "Are you sure of that ID?" itch I have with garden warblers and was relieved to have a blackcap bubbling away at the hide. Well-grown mallard ducklings and coots were catching midges on the pool and a pair of dabchicks chased each other about.

From the Tom Edmondson Hide 

The reed warbler and the Cetti's warbler sang reliably by the screen opposite the hide, a couple of reed buntings sang from the reeds on the other side of the pool.

At Ramsdales Hide

The pool on Ramsdales was busy, mostly with mallards and moorhen families. A pied wagtail fidgeted across the far bank, a trip of young-looking teals dabbled and a heron flew in and started catching dragonflies — there seemed to be an emergence of broad-bodied chasers over that side of the pool. Meanwhile, a brown hawker patrolled the reeds by the hide.

An enthusiastic birder from Halifax was enjoying his first visit to Pennington Flash and was made up when I told him to keep an ear out for the Cetti's warbler and right on cue the bird started singing. He tried his best to find me the kingfisher that kept zipping around but I missed it every time. I hope he got his photo of dabchicks for his mate.

Tufted ducks and shoveler

Coots having a barney

There was a handful of young gadwall amongst the mallards on Pengy's pool and enough three-quarters grown mallard ducklings to stop the identification being straightforward. The coots were mostly busy having scraps.

There was a stock dove there a moment ago 

I shared the Bunting Hide with a couple of squirrels and there were more on the feeding station. A stock dove was a fixture on the seed-laden bits of old wood; blue tits, great tits and chaffinches haunted the feeders and a couple of dunnocks and a young robin gathered scraps on the ground.

Chaffinch 

Feeding time: a dabchick has a fish for its young

The pool on the Charlie Owen Hide was busy. A dozen black-headed gulls made a noise, a couple of dozen tufted ducks dozed with half a dozen shovelers and more young gadwalls lurked amongst the mallards — the adults will be in the moulting flock at Woolston Eyes. A couple of very young lapwing chicks were striking out on their own together away from their parents. Meanwhile a pair of dabchicks were being kept busy feeding their youngster.

Lapwing chick

I hadn't seen many small birds along the paths so far on this visit, they were keeping out of the wind, so it was nice to hear a chiffchaff singing by the hide when I came out and to see the mixed flock of long-tailed and blue tits bouncing round the elder bushes by the path back to the flash.

Pengy's pool 

In the end I'd had a nice stroll, the weather behaved itself and there'd been plenty to see.

As the bus passed the site of Event City on the way home from the Trafford Centre I noticed there was a flock of more than sixty black-headed gulls plus a couple of dozen lesser black-backs loafing on the concrete. I'll have to have a proper look at this flock sometime soon.