Leighton Moss

Red deer

It looked like being a drier sort of day today so I got myself an old man's explorer ticket and headed for Leighton Moss.

As the train passed the coastal hides the usual family party of mute swans on the pool near the Eric Morecambe Hide were accompanied by herons, little egrets and a great white egret.

Goldfinches and chaffinch (middle)

The Hideout was busy both with birds and people. The crowds of goldfinches included a lot of rather scruffy looking youngsters halfway into their moult into adult plumage. They jostled with chaffinches, robins, great tits and coal tits while a scrum of pheasants and mallards picked up the spillings.

Dabchick 

Shoveler

Pintail (centre) with coots, gadwall and shoveler

Lilian's Hide was busy but not uncomfortably so. Dozens of coots and shovelers drifted and fed by the near bank of the pool with a couple of dozen gadwalls and a handful of dabchicks. Hiding on plain sight amongst them was my first pintail of the Winter, a rather pretty duck. The usual family of swans cruised by the far bank with a few more coots. A couple of migrant hawkers patrolled the reeds in front of the hide.

Pintail 

The walk down to the reedbed hides was busy with birds but reasonably quiet of people. Jays made a racket in the trees, woodpigeons clattered about, nuthatches called and wrens and robins sang. A mixed tit flock — great tits, blue tits and a couple of chiffchaffs — quietly flitted about in the willow undergrowth. Water rails were heard but not seen. Ditto the four Cetti's warblers along the path.

Red deer

Three red deer were grazing on the pool at the Tim Jackson Hide, one on the bund nearest to us, one in the middle of the pool feeding on the grass on a little island and one lurking in the reeds. The mass of shovelers, gadwalls and teal just treated them as obstacles to swim round.

I think I can be forgiven for not spotting this red deer immediately 

Gadwalls 

There were a few more gadwall and teal at the Griesdale Hide but it was pretty quiet all told. A few migrant hawkers zipped around by the hide, a Southern hawker came and eyeballed me as I started down the path through the reedbeds.

Nuthatch 

Walking back I bumped into another mixed tit flock in the willows. Great tits, blue tits, a few long-tailed tits, a couple each of nuthatches, treecreepers and goldcrests and just the one marsh tit.

Kestrel

Just by the visitor centre I was making sure all the goldfinches in the alders by the path were goldfinches when they all took flight. A kestrel settled in the top of the alders for a minute or two before moving on. The moment it left the goldfinches were back. I noticed some dark shapes high in the sky above the trees, they turned out to be a dozen swallows hawking way on high.

As I waited for the train at Silverdale Station the latest candidate for last butterfly of the year was a red admiral feeding on the ivy flowering on the wall.

Robin