Moore

Long-tailed duck

It was one of those days where you don't realise how bad the light is until you glance at the shutter settings your camera's chosen for a photo. It started off dark and gloomy, drizzled heavily for an hour or so and then settled for being a dark and gloomy day. I've had Moore Nature Reserve in my sights for a while, having last visited it in the nineties, a long-tailed duck was reported there over the weekend, I've not seen one this year so off I went.

I got the train to Warrington and then the number 12 bus to the Gainsborough Road stop on Chester Road. I crossed the road, walked a little way down then dropped down onto the bit of the Transpennine Trail that runs by this stretch of the Mersey.

Blackbird

Walking through this strip of light woodland was damp underfoot and the long pool between the path and the houses was very high. I'm not sure if this pool is a relic of the old Runcorn and Latchford Canal. It was very busy with moorhens and mallards. A mixed tit flock — a couple of dozen long-tailed tits, some blue tits and great tits and a couple of goldcrests — bounced to and fro between the trees and the back gardens.

Goldfinches

A flock of a couple of dozen goldfinches worked the cones on some young alders in the company of a couple of siskins.

Eastford Road 

I joined Eastford Road, walked under the viaducts and turned onto the lane for Moore Nature Reserve. Almost immediately I hit a puzzle. Two jackdaw-sized birds flew into one of the trees on the embankment, disappeared into the rough grass, flew into the tree then were off, all in a matter of seconds. All I was sure of was dark wings and tail and a lot of white on the rump and lower back and an odd call like a very contented hen. They came back for a very brief repeat performance and I was none the wiser. A process of elimination narrowed the suspects down to either jays or an insoluble mystery. Jays seemed more likely but the call baffled me. So I had a hunt through on Xeno-Canto: it's the courtship song. Well I never.

By the East Reedbed

As I walked down the lane there were more mixed tit flocks and small flocks of goldfinches and siskins. I saw a sign for the Phoenix Hide on the East Reedbed and followed the trail for a bit until it ended in a hip-high bank of damp sandy mud. I wasn't up for trying to scale it, especially as it was raining at the time, making it even more treacherous underfoot, so I walked back to the lane and carried on to the Pumphouse Pool.

Pumphouse Pool, the rail viaduct over the Ship Canal is on the left

The long-tailed duck had been seen on this pool from Colin's Hide, about fifty yards up a side path. The long-tailed duck was the second thing I saw, the first being the bloke sitting in the hide playing his transistor radio very loud (I didn't think they still made transistor radios). The duck was showing well, if distant, in the company of half a dozen tufted ducks. Walking back I bumped into a small flock of chaffinches feeding in the hedgerow and checked them in the doomed hope there might be some bramblings in there.

Birch Wood 

The rain stopped and it became a gloomy overcast day. The birch woods beyond the Pumphouse Pool were very quiet, just robins and wrens with the occasional passing blackbird. 

Long-tailed duck

I noticed a little hide giving a view of the Western side of the pool so I had a look to see if anything else was about. By pure dumb luck the long-tailed duck came swimming over and showed really well. Unfortunately the light was so bad half the photos I got had camera shake (500mm lens at one thirtieth of a second is pushing your luck a lot). It was a nice little thing. I can't tell a female long-tailed duck from a first-Winter male, it was one or the other.

Dabchick

I carried on through the birch woods to Birch Wood Pool which was noisy with a dozen frisky teal. A dozen black-headed gulls floated about, dozing and bathing. A similar number of coots were dotted about and four dabchicks hunted near the bank. A few black-headed gulls and lesser black-backs flew overhead and I very nearly missed a Mediterranean gull that passed by.

Birch Wood Pool 

The birch woods at this side of Lapwing Wood were even quieter than the woods I'd been walking through. 

Lapwing Wood 

As the path turned back on itself to run beside Lapwing Pool there was more variety of trees sitting in the pools and puddles, including a lot of oaks and alders, and a lot more birds. A couple of mixed tit flocks passed by and up in the top of one clump of alders a mixed finch flock included goldfinches, siskins and at least a couple of redpolls. I was trying to work my way through the silhouettes in the canopy when they decided to fly over to another stand of trees fifty yards down the way. I though I was looking at a few dozen finches, there were more than a hundred.

Wigeon

Lapwing Pool was busy with gadwall, coots, wigeon and shovelers with a few teal and mallards as supporting cast. A mixed tit flock passed through the reeds and noticed that somebody (not me) had put bird food down on the path to the hide. They weren't unduly bothered as I tiptoed my way through them to get back to the path.

Coal tit

I'd had three hours' exploring the site and my knees were starting to notice the damp so I called it quits, walking into Moore for the bus back to Warrington. I checked the times, didn't fancy waiting forty minutes for the next 62 so I walked down Runcorn Road and got the X30 back from Walton Hall. It had been a good few hours' birdwatching despite the dismal weather. I won't wait another nearly thirty years for a return visit.