Martin Mere

Whooper swans, greylags and mallards

It was another damp, grey morning and it started badly when the train into Manchester was cancelled. I took the time to have some breakfast for a change and watched the spadgers on the feeding stations. The weather patterns have certainly disrupted the plants in the garden: the squirrels and birds have stripped the Pyracantha of berries but there'll be more to come as half of it is in flower. I got the next train into Manchester which had to make an unscheduled stop at Deansgate, allowing me to catch the Southport train I'd intended to catch in the first place by the skin of my teeth. Sometimes the madness works your way.

Red Cat Lane 

I got off at Burscough Bridge and wandered down Red Cat Lane. There were a lot of jackdaws about, the rooks were mostly on a freshly-tilled field over towards Curlew Lane. Skylarks flew about in twos and threes, a flock of a few dozen lapwings flew over and small skeins of pink-footed geese passed by. A rattling in the treetops by Crabtree Lane heralded a few dozen fieldfares amongst the starlings. A sudden eruption of starlings and skylarks was caused by a male marsh harrier passing overhead with a carrion crow escort.

Whoopers, mallards and greylag

It was a damp entry into Martin Mere with deep puddles either end of the pedestrian entrance. I went straight over to the Discovery Hide to ser what was on the mere. The dozens of whooper swans were the most immediately obvious birds out here. There were similar numbers of greylag geese and mallards, rather more black-headed gulls and wigeon (they were making all the noise today) and a supporting cast of lapwings, shelducks, teal, pochard, tufted ducks, pintails and cormorants. A couple of marsh harriers flew over the distant fields, scattering lapwings and starlings in their wake. Eight snipe rose up from who knows where and headed off for the reedbeds beyond the mere.

Whooper cygnet

There was a small mixed flock of goldfinches and chaffinches in the trees by the Hale Observatory. I looked in vain for any siskins or redpolls. 

Cladonia lichen on tree stump

I found one of the snipe settling down for a kip on the pool by the Hale Hide. It was quickly woken up by the arrival of a little egret. Given the elegant appearance of little egrets it seems rather a shame for them to sound like industrial machinery in pain.

Snipe

Snipe and little egret

Great tits, blue tits and long-tailed tits bounced about in the trees along the path but the first mixed tit flock I encountered was in the hedge by the Ron Barker Hide. A dozen long-tailed tits flew over the path into the hedge and similar numbers of blue and great tits tagged along. There was a bit of a kerfuffle when a couple of great tits tried to bounce a dunnock away from a rotten fencepost. The dunnock stood its ground and got back to whatever it was interested in in the hollow of the top of the post. A migrant hawker zipped about the path catching midges and devouring them mid-air.

Walking by the Kingfisher Hide 

The scene at the Ron Barker Hide was one of contrasts: the pool on the left hosted one whooper swan, on the right there were a couple of dozen together with a hundred or more wigeon and a dozen or so teal. More ducks appeared on the pool when a couple of marsh harriers floated close over the reeds.

Whoopers, wigeon and cormorant

Close by a stoat fossicked around the base of the brambles on the bridge over the sluice. A stonechat kept an eye on it from the top of nearby reeds. A Cetti's warbler sang from our side of the sluice but I was beggared if I could see it.

I caught sight of a peregrine flying low over the woodland a couple of fields away. It disappeared behind the woods then reappeared in the company of two marsh harriers it had evidently decided to harass. The harriers gave as good as they got and taught the peregrine, probably a young bird putting itself through its paces, a good lesson in only picking fights with things that are smaller and weaker than you. The dogfight carried on for more than five minutes, complicated every so often by the intervention of carrion crows objecting to all three raptors.

It was a fairly quiet walk back bar the calls of passing jackdaws. I checked out the ivy-covered trees by the road for roosting tawny owls. I had no luck, which doesn't necessarily mean there weren't any, a Cape buffalo could easily hide in some of those treetops.

The road walked probably a bit too often for its own good

I had myself a cup of tea and decided to head for New Lane for the train home. The sun broke the clouds rather abruptly and the landscape was suddenly golden. Unlike the walking. The path by the fence to Martin Mere was a tad damp and at a couple of points I had to cling to the fence and tiptoe my way across muddy puddle margins. Luckily the electric fence wasn't switched on.

Marsh Moss Road 

Dozens of woodpigeons were settling down to roost in the treetops along Marsh Moss Lane as the gloom rolled back in. Small flocks of skylarks flew overhead and there was a steady traffic of black-headed gulls. I got to the station in plenty of time so I walked down the path a stretch to see what was on the water treatment works. The answer was more black-headed gulls. I walked back to the station to the sound of the calls of a small skein of pink-footed geese.