Hodbarrow

Little tern

I've had Hodbarrow in my sights for a few weeks and now the trains to Barrow are back in action and the weather okay there was no excuse not to go for a visit and, hopefully, add common tern and Sandwich tern to the year list. A very ropey night's sleep had me wondering if I really wanted to bother but I got myself an old man's explorer ticket and set out. The weather was gloomy and although I was overdressed for sitting in the train I was equal to the strong, cool wind that was blowing. I took my raincoat to make sure it wouldn't rain.

The trip up was without incident. Jackdaws, carrion crows and woodpigeons abounded. A couple of swifts flew low over Carnforth Station. The lesser black-backs of Manchester gave way to the black-headed gulls of Bolton and Chorley which gave way to the herring gulls and lesser black-backs of Preston. Herring gulls nested on Ulverston Station, the heronry at Meathop was busy, the black-headed gull colony on the coastal pools at Leighton Moss was packed. There was something on the old osprey's nest on Arnaby Moss but the black tail feather tips on show could have been a crow, rook, raven or even an osprey. 

The herring gulls at Ulverston Station were already nesting, these lesser black-backs were still billing and cooing.

I'd been doing so well with the train-bound birdwatching and the weather was looking so unpromising I wondered if I should just stay on the train and leave Hodbarrow for another day. I dragged myself off the train at Millom and headed for Hodbarrow and I would have good reason for being glad that I did.

The chiffchaff singing at the station was the last warbler I'd hear for the next mile. Blackbirds, chaffinches and collared doves sang, the rookery was noisy and busy and every other rooftop had its crowd of herring gulls or pair of lesser black-backs. Spadgers fussed in garden hedges, greenfinches and goldfinches in treetops. A handful of swallows hawked at chimney pot height above the road.

Walking into Hodbarrow 

Walking into Hodbarrow I was greeted by singing chiffchaffs and willow warblers, which came as a bit of a relief after a warbler-free walk by the hedgerows. I needn't have worried; the reserve was heaving with warblers. The singing at the entrance was accompanied by absurd bubblings and croaks which told me that the mixed colony of cormorants and little egrets was in full swing. I walked through to the edge of the lagoon and looked over: a couple of dozen cormorants were on nests, there were a similar number of little egrets in the trees but I could only find a couple of nests. A raft of herring gulls and lesser black-backs loafed in this relatively quiet corner of the lagoon.

Cormorants and little egrets 

Walking along chaffinches and blackcaps joined the songscape in the trees, blackbirds, whitethroats and a song thrush sang from the gorse bushes. Every so often a dunnock or linnet would strike a pose in a gorse bush and sing. Greenfinches and goldfinches twittered between trees, robins staked out the path margins, sand martins flew round the old iron mines. And all the time there was a constant traffic of rather noisy black-headed gulls.

Walking towards the old iron mines

Red-breasted mergansers
Mergansers nearly always strike me as having untidy crests but when you see them in display like this they make sense.

The terns I heard a long time before they came into view. The corner of the lagoon by the iron mines was dotted with eiders, tufted ducks and Canada geese. Two drake red-breasted mergansers were putting a lot of work into impressing a duck, their slow motion head bobbing accentuated by the symmetry of their long bills and crests. A few terns flew in and wheeled round before disappearing over to the noisy colony on the shingle over by the sea wall, they were all common terns. Odd ones and twos flew by as I watched the mergansers. Then one that didn't quite look right. The grey belly looking slightly darker than the wings might have been a trick of the light but the plain pale wings were those of an arctic tern and the black cap not stretching down the nape made the head look different to the common terns. I was quite chuffed to get two additions to the year list so quickly.

Old iron mines from the sea wall

Eider on the lagoon

Eiders on the Duddon Estuary 

I joined the path on the sea wall. Over on the Duddon Estuary a few pairs of eiders bobbed in the sea, on the lagoon there were hundreds of them. A flock of swallows twittered madly as they flew over the sea wall at knee height. Herring gulls flew out to sea, black-headed gulls flew hither and thither but the noise of the gulls was equalled by the calls of terns. Most were common terns, many dozens of them rather than the hundreds of gulls but making up for numbers in noise. A few Sandwich terns and common terns flew over the sea wall to fish in the estuary. Most of the little terns stayed in the lagoon. Every year I'm surprised by how small little terns are.

Ringed plover making sure I stay on the path

I walked over to the hide. Linnets chipped from clumps of mustard and ringed plovers tried to distract me from patches of bare ground so I was careful to stick to the path. I was scanning the lagoon as I walked along and got a surprise when I noticed a whimbrel standing on the rubble that serves as a screen between the path and the shingle.

Whimbrel 

Eiders

Eiders, oystercatchers and herring gulls 

Black-headed gulls 

Little terns

I sat in the hide and scanned the shingle banks. Hundreds of black-headed gulls sat on nests, hundreds of eiders loafed, many dozens of common terns fussed about. There weren't many Sandwich terns but they were busy making babies. The little terns kept to a couple of shingle islands. A distant black-tailed godwit in rust red breeding plumage dazzled amongst all this monochrome. A couple of dunlins and a few more ringed plovers skittered about, a redshank flew in, a couple of lapwings lost themselves in the crowds. A very dapper common gull preened at the edge of a pool.

The view from the hide

I was about to leave when the lady sitting nearby said: "Roseate tern!" It took me a while to see where she was looking but there, fast asleep by a pair of black-headed gulls, was a bright pink tern. My fears that it was a common tern that had done well on a shrimp diet were allayed when it woke up and had a look round, displaying a great black dagger of a beak. It promptly went back to sleep again before I could get my camera on it. I really wasn't expecting a life tick today!

Black-headed gulls, common tern (centre left), roseate tern (centre, in front of the pair of gulls) and Sandwich tern (right)

Male wheatear 

Female wheatear 

I tried and failed to not disturb the ringed plovers on the way out and bumped into a pair of wheatears. Walking back a sedge warbler riffing a rapid series of squeaks, churrs and rattles was a nice bonus for the year list.

It's a very substantial sea wall

If I didn't dawdle I'd be okay for the quarter past four train back to Barrow. I checked the times and found it was running three-quarters of an hour late. So I sat down for a bit and listened to the songs of linnets, chiffchaffs, blackcaps and a song thrush as sand martins flew overhead.

Walking back from the sea wall 

I got the late-running train and even though it didn't stop at any of the stations before Barrow I still missed the Manchester train by ten minutes. I got the next train to Lancaster, enjoying the little egrets and shelducks on the fields and marshes and the marsh harrier cruising the pools at Leighton Moss, then had an hour's wait for the next train to Manchester from Lancaster. Which, surprisingly, didn't take the gloss off an excellent day's birdwatching.