Wild goose chase

Pink-footed geese

A red-breasted goose had been lingering on Banks Marsh over the weekend. I would have hated myself if I hadn't had a go at seeing if it was still there, not least because it's the only goose on the British List I haven't seen.

I got ready to get the train into Oxford Road that would give me time to get my tickets, renew my monthly travel card and get a cup of tea. And it was cancelled. It's Northern's turn for the ASLEF strike on Friday, this was just Monday as usual. I decided to get the train into Urmston, sort out tickets and card there and hope to connect with the Blackpool train and change at Bolton for Southport. Then I realised that if I stayed on the train up to Liverpool South Parkway I could get the Northern Line train to Southport and get there about the same time. (In the event I got there half an hour earlier because that Southport train was cancelled). I bought a ticket to Liverpool off the guard and we were both amazed that a return from Manchester to Liverpool is two pounds cheaper than a return from Humphrey Park. So I got that. Travelling on our rail services is a lot like a large-scale puzzle game, The Crystal Maze without the sense of urgency. Once I settled into the sense that I was going on an adventure the journey went swimmingly.

I had half an hour to wait for the bus to Banks so I had a quick nosy at Southport Marine Lake. There were all the usual suspects — mute swans, mallards, coots, black-headed gulls and herring gulls with a raft of tufted ducks and a pair of greylags — but not in huge numbers unless they were all over the over end of the lake demanding breadcrumbs with menaces.

Pintails

I got off the bus at the corner of New Lane Pace and Marsh Road and immediately wondered if I was being entirely sensible. Although it was a mild day it was heavily overcast, the rain was light but steady and there was a bitingly cold wind blowing in from Preston. There didn't look to be a lot about on the fields as I walked up the road. I disturbed a red-legged partridge which spent the next couple of minutes clucking alarm calls at me from the security of a harvested cabbage patch. A few mallards and shelducks browsed a ploughed field that was being patrolled by a kestrel while lapwings, woodpigeons and greenfinches flew about overhead. Small flocks of mallards and shelducks flew to and fro and a skein of pintails flew inland from the marsh. A patch of white at the end of one of the drains caught my eye. At first I thought it was a whooper swan then I realised it was more than one bird. They looked too small for either whooper or mute swans but that could have been the angle I was seeing them at. Then they noticed me and five necks were raised to have a look to make sure I was harmless. The short, goose-like necks of Bewick's swans.

Marsh Road

At first sight the marsh was very quiet. A few hundred wigeon and a similar number of teal dabbled in the pools and drains. Further out there were small flocks of dunlins, redshanks and lapwings and a few curlews probed the marsh. Three pink-footed geese flew out towards the estuary and that was it, no more geese in sight. Admittedly the light and visibility were lousy but there were no signs of the usual crowds.

Banks Marsh 

Rather fearing I was on a fool's errand I trudged along the bund towards the pumphouse. The freeze and thaw of the weekend made the going a bit heavy and slippery and my stealth squelching made the wigeon and teal move out of the drains and over onto the pools. Little egrets bounced about the marsh, meadow pipits fussed about the bund.

Pink-footed geese

As I approached the pumphouse I could start to see flocks of pink-footed geese grazing the marsh further along. By the time I got to the Pumphouse I was in line with the first few family groups. They kept an eye on me as I passed, as did the flock of wigeon grazing alongside. By and large the geese were fine with the idea of my walking by but got fidgety whenever I stopped to have a scan round. There were hundreds, perhaps a thousand, geese grazing in the gloom and as far as I could see they were all pink-feet. Some of the young birds were very dark and looked as if they had a bit of growing to do yet and I found myself double-checking every time I caught sight of one. A flash of orange beak caught my eye and I found myself a consolation tundra bean goose. And promptly lost it again as that group of geese got their heads down to graze and shuffled about behind a small mound. Further out a couple of tall white posts started moving and stalking the marsh and I realised I'd been missing a couple of great white egrets.

Pink-footed geese and red-breasted goose (furthest right of the flying birds)

I was having no luck finding a red-breasted goose but I wouldn't have been happy with myself if I hadn't tried. And there were more geese further along. A small, dark goose caught my eye but it disappeared into the crowd and I concluded it was one of the young pink-feet. There were small groups of geese further out in the marsh and one of these took flight and flew over to the crowd I'd been checking out. I only glanced at first then realised that one of the geese wasn't a pink-foot. It was slightly smaller and much more compact even than a pink-foot, and it was black on the upperparts. The geese wheeled and I got a good, though still fairly distant, view of the red-breasted goose. In the gloom the dark red of the breast and side of neck looked black but I could just make out a white line at the side of the neck and a white spot by the bill. 

The geese disappeared into the distant crowd. I was heading that way anyway so I kept an eye on them as I walked along. I was having no luck finding the red-breasted goose on the ground but the group it was in had landed in a far corner so I wasn't losing hope yet. Then a jet fighter shot down the estuary a couple of times. The second sonic boom brought every goose on the estuary up and any chances of reconnecting with my quarry vanished as they settled on the far distant marsh.

No matter, I had my goose. I just needed to get back home now.

I'd nearly reached the gate to the bund that stretches down to Hundred End Lane when I spotted a few ducks on the marsh. There were a few mallards and some wigeon. One of the wigeon sitting on the bank of a drain didn't quite look right. I moved along a bit and managed to get a better look at it and took a full minute to realise I was staring at the straw yellow head and broad green eyestripe of an American wigeon. A dead jammy bonus which confirms that fortune favours the daft.

Cabbages

The walk down the bund to Hundred End Lane was even more treacherous and slippery: as well as the freeze and thaw it had had a flock of sheep running about on it, chopping up the ground with their tiny, pointed hooves. They seemed an amiable bunch, though. The hedgerows down the bottom were busy with blackbirds and fieldfares and the field beyond was full of whooper swans, shelducks and greylags.

Whooper swans, pink-footed geese and greylags

We didn't have a sunset so much as a fade to darker grey as I waited the quarter hour for the bus back to Southport. I was dead knackered but it had been a surprisingly good day's birdwatching.