Moses Gate

Heron on the River Croall

Meteorological Autumn was very Autumnal and I decided not to go out for a walk in the pouring rain. The weather tidied itself up somewhat late afternoon so I had a toddle round Moses Gate Country Park to fill in one of the gaps in this year's list.

I got off the 524 and walked down to the river. The change of season was as apparent in the colour of the leaves on some of the trees as the appearance of a mixed tit flock by the path. Great tits, blue tits and long-tailed tits bounced and flitted between the trees while the chiffchaffs preferred to rummage about in the stands of Himalayan balsam. Another touch of Autumn was the robin and wren duet in the car park.

River Croall

The Croall tumbled fast over the flat weir and burbled and meandered its way through the park. A heron lurked at the base of the weir ready to snap up any fish unlucky enough to be caught by the flow.

River Croall 

Moses Gate Country Park 

I had a wander round the lake which was lined with Canada geese, mallards and black-headed gulls and littered with coots, mute swans and lesser black-backs while cormorants sat on posts and dried their wings. Most of the swans and gulls were over by the car park on the cadge. For all the noise of the black-headed gulls they were being easily out-shouted by the begging calls of a well-grown great crested grebe's humbug as it closely shadowed its hunting parent. Out in the middle of the lake another grebe had a rather smaller humbug riding on its back.

Great crested grebes and mallard

Great crested grebes 

Great crested grebes 

Canada geese 

Mallards and Canada geese loafed by the smaller pools by the side, gadwalls, coots and tufted ducks drifting about on the water.

Moses Gate Country Park 

Robins, wrens and great tits called and sang in the trees round the lake, chiffchaffs squeaked and chaffinches chased each other round the treetops. It all already felt very different to the quiet days of August.

I walked down Hall Lane into Moses Gate and just missed the 22 back to the Trafford Centre so I got the 37 and caught the 21 in Swinton. As the 37 passed Blackleach Country Park I toyed with the idea of getting off for a quick nosy, looked at the clouds overhead and decided not to push my luck. The rain subsided as we got into Swinton and it was almost sunny when the 21 got to the Trafford Centre.