Denbighshire

Herring gulls, Colwyn Bay 

It was another mild and mizzly day in Manchester with the tops of the vainglorious tower blocks of the city centre lost in the clouds so the obvious thing to do was to go to the seaside to look for distant ducks.

I had an envelope full of rail travel vouchers to use up so I put half of them towards a return ticket to Colwyn Bay. A surf scoter's been reported all week as being in the rafts of common scoters in the bay, I thought I'd have a go at finding it. And if no joy it's a nice place for a bit of seawatching anyway. There's a surf scoter on the North Wales coast most Winters, I don't know if it's the same bird each time. Last year I struck lucky and saw a couple of them off Llandulas.

It became a clear, bright, cloudy day. The line along the North Wales coast has plenty to recommend it for the sedentary birdwatcher though I could have done with the train finding some signals to stop at so I could have a proper look at some of the waders. Carrion crows, woodpigeons, jackdaws and herring gulls were the staple fare. Here or there there'd be a crowd of black-headed gulls, little egrets or redshanks. A flock of pink-feet grazing in a field near Llanerch-y-Môr viaduct was unexpected .A herd of mute swans seemed to have Rhyl Marine Lake to themselves. Half a dozen drake goosanders were showing off to a couple of redheads as the train passed over the Clwyd.

Colwyn Bay 

I got off at Colwyn Bay and walked round to the beach. The path under the expressway comes out at the pier, it would have been rude not to walk to the end to do a bit of seawatching. 

Mackerel fishermen 

It was a couple of hours after high tide but unlike the Wirral there's a steep shelf just offshore so the sea doesn't go far out. Close by there was a steady passage of herring gulls and there was almost as many black-headed gulls and cormorants as mackerel fishermen setting up their gear on the tideline. Carrion crows and jackdaws fussed about on the beach.

At first sight the sea at Colwyn Bay was empty

It wasn't.
You'll need to click on this picture to enlarge it enough to see the common scoters. There are a few pale cheeked females at the front.

About half a mile out the sea was littered with hundreds of common scoter. It took about ten minutes to get my eye in so I was seeing duck shapes rather than than indistinct dots. I was helped a lot by a few groups drifting in ever so slightly, once I had them in focus the further groups became less difficult. A great crested grebe swimming past about a hundred yards out helped me establish a sense of scale. Hundreds of common scoters. With just my bins to play with I wrote off my chances of seeing any other type of scoter out there without the aid of Providence.

Walking to Old Colwyn

It's a nice walk down the prom towards Old Colwyn. A crowd of herring gulls bathed in the outflow by the Port Eirias Centre in the company of a few black-headed gulls and jackdaws, a gang of carrion crows and a great black-back. A little further on a couple of oystercatchers probed the mud by the seawall.

Herring gulls and carrion crow, Colwyn Bay 

Herring gulls and carrion crow, Colwyn Bay 

Herring gulls, great black-back and carrion crow, Colwyn Bay 

Colwyn Bay 

I kept stopping and scanning the distant scoters. A couple of odd-looking birds turned out to be the back ends of fishing cormorants. Then I saw a flash of white where there shouldn't be one. The surf scoter must have been three-quarters of a mile out but it was facing me and reared up to stretch its wings. A flash of white on the front of the head then it settled down on the water and I lost it in the crowd. I saw it again a few hundred yards down the prom, it had turned its back to the shore, making it very much harder to pick out the white markings on the head. I owe Providence a cup of tea.

Heron and little egret, Colwyn Bay 

Aside from the two oystercatchers I hadn't seen any waders on the beach, it was far too busy with people and dogs. I passed a couple of small stone groynes and had no luck finding turnstones. The third one I passed was different: there were a dozen of them fossicking about on that one. And only that one, I didn't see any more further along. A couple of rock pipits flitted about the sea wall but didn't settle. A bit further along a heron and a little egret shared the fishing on a pool. And out at sea there were more distant scoters.

Old Colwyn

River Clwyd 

I didn't have the legs in me for the walk to Llandulas so I went into Old Colwyn and got the bus to Kimmel Bay for a potter about Horton's Nose and the harbour. The tide was well out here, the tideline marked by a distant line of cormorants. The best part of a hundred gulls loafed on the beach, a large flock of herring gulls and a few smaller flocks of black-headed gulls, there were plenty of both flying about with an eye on the half-term main chance. A pair of goosanders fished the river by the harbour, redshanks and black-tailed godwits rummaged about in the mud, and a large flock of pigeons had congregated on the mud under the road bridge for I know not what reason.

Horton's Nose 

River Clwyd 

The sun finally made an appearance as I walked over to Rhyl Station for the train home, walking by the marine lake on my way. The herd of mute swans shared the lake with a lone goosander and a small flock of black-headed gulls, a few herons and cormorants loafing and dozing on the island.

Rhyl Marine Lake 

The North Wales coast in the golden hour was my reward for good timing for the journey back. Shelducks dabbled in the mud as the train passed close by the Flintshire coast. I often mock myself for staring out of train windows in the forlorn hope of seeing an owl in the twilight. As we passed Hawarden Airport there was still enough light to watch a short-eared owl as it floated low over the trackside field.

Trains

The frequent reader might suspect that I exaggerate our local train cancellations for comedic effect. This is this morning's performance.

We've not had a 0924 for eight years. Today's 0848 was cancelled and the next train had extra stops added.

Dreich

It was a day of almost unrelenting mizzle, the damp penetrating to the soul of man and beast alike. I had two plans for today, both of them contingent on my leaving the house early and having the energy to be bothered. The cat tried her best with the first, I wasn't equal to either. It was still plenty early enough for any number of birdwatching expeditions but the weather conspired with my bone-idleness so I had breakfast and set to with the task of drinking far too much tea before heading out for a late afternoon walk over the mosses to see what was going to roost and if any owls were about.

The spadgers and great tits finished off the last of the sunflower seeds and started making inroads on the suet blocks I've put out. I'm putting the blocks out rather than fat balls to stop the squirrels stealing the lot. They've learned how to spring open the caps to the fat ball holders whereas the blocks are in sturdy metal cages that can be threaded onto the feeding station hooks so the weight of the cages keeps them closed. The squirrels can still have a feed but so can everyone else. They'll soon have other things on their minds, there's already a lot of flirting going on along the garden fence. And judging by the sounds coming down the chimney the jackdaws are getting a bit amorous, too.

I'm surprised by how quickly I've gotten used to the parakeets being part of the local soundscape. They're keeping to the parks and roadside trees so far. Fingers crossed they'll stay there and out of my garden.

Humphrey Park Station 

It had been so gloomy the lights at the station had been on all day. It was still only mid-afternoon as I stood in the boding gloom and watched the starlings, parakeets and magpies start to make tracks to roost. There were a couple of dozen starlings, I don't know where they go all day but mid-afternoon they congregate in a couple of big sycamores a couple of roads down before flying off to roost. The magpies have spent all day on the school playing field. The flock of sixteen parakeets came as a shock, I've only been seeing them in threes or fours.

The train was late leaving Oxford Road because it had to wait for the Transpennine Express train that was running even later than usual. I peered into the gloom, the mist hiding the trees and houses a hundred yards away. Did I really want to go traipsing across the mosses in this then hang about til twilight before heading home? Not really. So I didn't. I'll feel dead guilty about it later.

Wirral

Shelducks, Meols

The morning trains were behaving themselves today so I had the trip out to the Wirral I'd planned for yesterday. The aim being to look out for turnstones, ringed plovers and any other waders I've not seen lately and particularly to try and find some black-tailed godwits as I've not seen any on the Wirral this year which is unusual.

Joining Meols Promenade by the lifeboat station 

It was threatening to be a sunny day when I set off but it was pouring down as we passed through Widnes. As I got off the train at Manor Road and walked down to the lifeboat station it was a gloomy grey day with a surprisingly mild breeze.

Shelduck, Hoylake 

It was a couple of hours after high tide so there was a great stretch of wet muddy sand punctuated here and there with curlews, redshanks and shelducks before the distant lines of tideline cormorants and great black-backs. Closer by redshanks, mallards and shelducks dodged in and out of the stretches of wet marram and sea plantain while linnets and pied wagtails rummaged around in deep cover.

Little egret, Hoylake 

A few little egrets shrimped on the pools by the seawall. Every so often a passing dog would get giddy and make chase, the egrets would bark raucously as they took flight, land a few yards to the side and return immediately the dog was on its way.

Shelducks, Hoylake 

Beyond the marram a few dunlins skittered about on the mud and a couple of grey plovers, hunchbacked, slowly stalked about and snapped at shrimps and passing flies.

Walking down the promenade the marram gave way to muddy sand and samphire. Small groups of shelducks came closer to the seawall while knots and oystercatchers joined the redshanks further out. I still hadn't seen any ringed plovers though. A flock of small plovers flew past but they were all dunlins. They headed for Hoylake, I carried on walking into Meols.

By Meols Promenade 

The mud and meandering creeks and rills of Meols beach were littered with oystercatchers, redshanks and loafing herring gulls. Small groups of shelducks dabbled in the wet mud, curlews stalked alone and contorted themselves as they battled to dig ragworms out of their tunnels.

Rock pipit, Meols

A quick call and a passing dark shape turned out to be a rock pipit which landed on the algae-strewn seawall and ducked its head down every time the camera got it in focus. They know, you know. I don't know why but I'm always slightly surprised by how big rock pipits are, and how dark.

Turnstones, Meols

I joined the revetment and walked down to the groyne. Black-headed gulls called noisily from the pools at the foot of the wall and turnstones rummaged about in the stranded seaweed.

Beyond the groyne a couple of herons and some cormorants fished the deeper pools, herring gulls and lesser black-backs loafed on sandbanks and black-headed gulls generally fussed about.

Leasowe Common, Leasowe Lighthouse on the left

I left the revetment and dropped down onto Leasowe Common as patches of blue sky showed themselves and the sun threatened to come out. I dallied with the idea of taking the muddy track into the trees but elected to stay on the metalled path and keep my ears open. Robins, wrens and goldfinches skittered about and a couple of meadow pipits flew overhead but it was pretty quiet overall.

I turned onto the path that passes by the pond. There was no sign of the usual moorhens and even though it was so mild it was evidently too dull even for common darters to be out. A flock of goldfinches bounced about in the treetops by the horse paddocks and a great spotted woodpecker called from a big tree over the other side.

Chiffchaff, Leasowe Common 

I let on to another birdwatcher as we crossed along the path through the trees by the paddocks. He'd been watching a goldcrest in the willows further up. As I walked on I kept an eye out for any warblers. A flash of white wing stripe in a sycamore tree caught my eye found me a small flock of chaffinches. It soon became apparent they were part of a larger mixed flock: blue tits, long-tailed tits and goldfinches were busy and conspicuous, great tits and goldcrests more self-effacing. A chiffchaff bounded up and fed in the branches just overhead. The Cetti's warbler I'd hoped to hear when I walked past the pond decided to have a bit of a sing now I was fifty yards away. A couple of blackbirds came up to see what I was about and decided I was of no consequence; a dunnock decided it was time I was on my way. After a minute or two I decided to take the hint.

Black-tailed godwits, Kerr's Field 

I found the godwits I'd been missing at Kerr's Field. In their Winter greys they sorted of melted into the vivid greens of the wet grass and were surprisingly difficult to see. The oystercatchers, pied wagtails and curlews in the field were a bit more conspicuous.

Curlew and black-tailed godwit, Kerr's Field 

Over on the far side of the field a couple of wigeon, the drake in ginger eclipse plumage, grazed amongst the mallards in a deep puddle.

I walked up to Moreton Station and wondered if I had the time and energy to move on to another site. I decided I hadn't, I'd walked the stiffness out of the joints but not the aches and there was no point in spoiling an excellent afternoon's birdwatching. I might have felt differently had the sun not retreated behind a thick blanket of cloud.

Kerr's Field 

Home thoughts

It was a wet and dreary day, the first of many we're promised for this week. I had a couple of plans for avoiding the worst of the weather and a couple for getting wet but it would be worth it and all were kiboshed by such a long catalogue of cancelled trains I had to check it wasn't Saturday. I decided to have an early lunch and go out and get wet locally but then got sidetracked with a technical support call for my father then got home and found I had to sort out the same problem at home and by the time I'd finished with that I wondered if anything would actually be about: it was so gloomy at lunchtime the day shift would be going to roost and the night shift would be keeping undercover hoping the rain might abate a bit.

The carrion crow had started singing before dawn. It was a good hour later that the wren belted out its claim to the back garden and the robin rather later. I think this Winter I'm in the middle of a robin's territory rather than the edge, most of the singing's happening a few doors down either way. I was confused for a while as to the territories at the station but I think that what's happened is that the boundary runs diagonally along the line, one bird having most of the Western end of platform two, the Eastern half of the park and the steam roller's garden, the other having the rest of the station and the first terrace of houses along.

Grudging respect to the squirrel, by the way, for finding a way into the squirrel-proof feeder. Literally. I'd thought I'd been careless putting the lid back on the other day but I've just watched it take three minutes to open the spring catch and lever the lid open. It then hung upside down in the tube filling its mouth pouches with sunflower seeds before struggling its way back out backwards.

The absence of woodpigeons isn't as striking round here this year compared to last. There's usually one or two around the school and today I passed half a dozen on the way to my father's. Still nothing like the big Summer flocks or the relatively small but constant presence we have over Winter. There's still just the one collared dove kicking about though, I don't know where the others have got to.

It's half term so the usual gang of gulls tooled up to school bang on what was lunchtime last week, found there was nothing doing and headed off for the Trafford Centre. A couple of herring gulls lingered to dance for worms on the playing field but soon tired of the sport and followed the gang. It'll be interesting to see what happens next week when they come round at what is now 11am, find nothing doing, go away and find out they missed on the return to school lunchtime bonanza. I don't know what mechanism they use for passing the news around but I know they must have one, they always start drifting in in numbers a few days after the start of the Autumn term after a lean Summer.

Ramsgreave and Wilpshire

Along Parsonage Road 

I got some sleep and woke up to a cool and sunny morning. It being a Saturday of course the train I intended getting into town was cancelled. Which worked out in my favour, I wouldn't otherwise have added the two skylarks passing overhead to my garden list as I put bottles out in the bin. The collared dove provided a late dawn chorus, the jackdaws and rooks have been getting frisky of late, Spring is in the air. As I left the house I noticed that it's that time of year when I can't pretend the living room window doesn't need cleaning and I can't pretend I leave well alone so baby spadgers don't fly into it.

A Slavonian grebe had been reported yesterday at Parsonage Reservoir just outside Wilpshire and on a whim I thought I'd go and see if it was still there. I've already got Slavonian grebe on the year list but I don't see them often enough to be blasé about them and I've not seen one anywhere in Lancashire before. Besides, I don't know that part of Lancashire at all well, and much of that awfully out of date. The train cancellation made the connections at Oxford Road and Salford Crescent very tight but I made them safely and got off the Clitheroe train at Ramsgreave and Wilpshire Station just before lunchtime.

By Parsonage Road 

By this time there were reports that the grebe was nowhere to be seen. No matter, it was a very nice day for a walk. Parsonage Reservoir is just short of a mile's walk from the station. It's a dead straight walk down Parsonage Road. Oddly, the traffic was dead quiet in the village but as soon as the pavement ran out the traffic got busier. The jackdaws, pigeons and spadgers of Ramsgreave gave way to the black-headed gulls, starlings and carrion crows of the open fields. A couple of pied wagtails flew over, a noisy flock of a couple of dozen lesser black-backs and herring gulls loafed a couple of fields up.

In my experience there are, very broadly, two types of reservoir as far as birdwatching is concerned: the pit stops and the make yourself comfortables. The make yourself comfortables are usually peppered with coots, mallards and black-headed gulls, there'll be a raft of large gulls and it will have a family of dabchicks if you look hard enough. A lot of Pennine reservoirs are pit stops, there'll generally be some large gulls roosting and/or bathing and perhaps a handful of black-headed gulls or a small flock of Canada geese but most anything else is just stopping by for a quick rest, though they may linger if they find the amenities congenial. The 'anything else' can be almost anything else, or absolutely nothing. I think patch watchers who have a pit stop reservoir on their beat must have nerves of steel. And there's no sure way of looking at a map and predicting whether or not a reservoir is a pit stop.

Parsonage Reservoir 

A single black-headed gull flew around the field by the reservoir as I approached the gate with the "Keep Out: private property and take your dog mess with you" signs. It didn't take a lot of scanning over the reservoir from the roadside to pick it out as a pit stop. It's a smallish reservoir and a dozen large gulls, nearly all lesser black-backs, were bathing midwater. The black-headed gull landed on the bankside. And that was it. I walked down the road, stopping to scan the reservoir with each change of angle but found no more. I wasn't even finding any wagtails or pipits about.

Hollowhead Lane 

I didn't fancy exploring further up what was becoming quite a busy road but I also didn't want to just retrace my steps all the way back so I walked back a little then down Hollowhead Lane past the golf club and into Wilpshire. A male kestrel hunted the fields by the road, carrion crows cat-called golfers from the safety of treetops and robins and great tits bustled about in hedgerows.

I had plenty of time and no particular place to go so I spent the rest of the afternoon bus-hopping, getting to know a bit more of the area and enjoying the scenery along the way. If I ever get old enough to get a pensioner's bus pass (the goal posts move every time I approach them) I'll be doing a lot of that. 

Looking up in passing at one of the slopes on Pendle Hill I wondered how I was idiot enough as a kid to slide down it on a sheet of sacking. No wonder the bones hurt when I get off a bus.

Irlam Locks

Female house sparrow, Irlam Locks 

I was a lot low energy today after only getting to sleep some time after four so I knocked the ambitious plans for today on the head. Additionally the black dog's been biting this week, it does this time of year, and I decided I really couldn't be bothered. The garden was full of mixed tit flock and spadgers, I need to refill those feeders tomorrow.

It was a leaden grey sky but a mild, dry day so I decided I should get some exercise anyway so I got the 256 down to Town Gate and had a dawdle round Irlam Locks to see if anything was about.

Juvenile house sparrow, Irlam Locks 

The spadgers on Irlam Road were busy gleaning the last of the aphids from the sycamores in the hedgerows while dunnocks, wrens and robins rummaged about in the hawthorns. Overhead a harbinger of Winter's starling flocks, just a dozen birds, creaked and rattled as they lined up on the cables between the electricity pylons.

A couple of dozen magpies bounced around the water treatment works with a couple of carrion crows. I'd hoped for a wagtail or three but it wasn't my day for it. Sadly, all the hedges around the works are out of bounds after the canalside path fell into the canal years ago. Sewage works hedgerows can be very fruitful with passage migrants and Winter warblers.

A dozen mallards and half a dozen black-headed gulls drifted aimlessly on the canal above the locks. Seventy-odd pigeons and forty-odd black-headed gulls loafed on the lock sides with a couple of herring gulls.

Manchester Ship Canal 
Looking downstream from Irlam Locks towards the railway bridge 

I wandered onto the locks for a look downstream. Three great crested grebes hugged the bank on the Irlam side, mallards and moorhens pottered about on the Flixton side. A few cormorants and another thirty-odd pigeons mooched about on the structures below the lock gates which seem designed for that very purpose.

On the way back I noticed a couple of dabchicks just before they noticed me a dived under a maintenance jetty. A lady had wheeled her baby down the road to look at the ducks and sure as eggs a mute swan came to join them.

A mixed tit flocks was rummaging about in the hedgerows down Irlam Road as I walked back. I got the bus home and arrived to find a collared dove singing from the chimney top. They've not been around this past couple of weeks, it's good to see them back.

Marshside and Crossens Marsh

Snow goose, Marshside

The top order collapse and middle order collapse in England's Test Match innings gave me an incentive to go out for a walk. So I headed over to Southport to see what was on the marshes. 

For once the trains behaved impeccably. It's that time of year when I notice the lack of woodpigeons. There was the usual complement of carrion crows, jackdaws and magpies as we chugged through Greater Manchester and West Lancashire but the first woodpigeons were at Southport. Along the way there were jays in Lostock, a huge raft of coots on the lake at Pemberton Park, fields full of black-headed gulls and field drains full of mallards and teal. As I waited for the 44 bus to take me to Marshside something, I know not what, caused a huge panic amongst the healthy population of pigeons and herring gulls on the rooftops of Southport town centre. I can imagine a sparrowhawk or peregrine putting up the pigeons but not the gulls, unless they were just being offended by the intrusion.

Geese stopped play

It would have been a relatively warm, if cloudy, day but for the strong breeze. The school playing field on Marshside Road was littered with pink-footed geese with any gaps were filled in by black-headed gulls.

Black swans, Marshside 

The marshes either side of the road were busy with birds. On the side by the golf club Canada geese, greylags and four black swans grazed in the wet grass while hundreds of wigeon, teal and black-tailed godwits loafed by the pools and puddles with scores of lapwings, a handful of ruffs and here and there a few dozen shovelers. 

Shovelers, Marshside 

Black-tailed godwits, Marshside

Pink-footed geese, Marshside 

On Sutton's Marsh, the one on the right-hand side of the road as you walk out, it was a bit different. There were no birds at all within a hundred yards of the road, not even any starlings. Beyond that it was heaving with Canada geese, greylags, pink-footed geese, wigeons, lapwings, starlings and black-tailed godwits. A few groups of curlews fed in the grass and every creek and drain seemed to have a little egret. The waders and starlings were very skittish, something kept bringing them up then they'd settle for half a minute and then they'd be up again. I strongly suspected a merlin was about but I couldn't see one. Eventually I found a kestrel hovering over the marsh close to a lot of very fidgety lapwings and concluded that must be spooking them.

Wigeons and lapwings, Marshside 

The pool by Sandgrounders was empty though the banks and islands were chockablock with ducks. Wigeons grazed the banks while mallards, teal and tufted ducks dozed on the bankside with a couple of cormorants. A great black-back loafed on its own just beyond.

Teal, Marshside 

There was excitement at Sandgrounders as somebody had found a long-tailed duck amongst the gadwalls, wigeons and teal on the pool. I arrived just as it cruised up the channel at the back and out of sight. This channel curves round the back of the pools and you can see bits of it if you're tall enough and standing up. I could find a pair of shovelers, some wigeons and a teal. No matter, there was plenty else about, most of them wigeons, teal, gadwalls or shovelers. In front of the hide pairs of mallards were doing naughty mallard things without a hint of shame about it. There was a merlin about: it made a couple of ambush passes and put up all the godwits, lapwings and starlings feeding in the grass, a lot of the godwits coming in to land on the pools where they'd get earlier sighting of a third pass. The third pass was by the kestrel as it unsuccessfully tried its luck.

The pool by Sandgrounders
The back channel the long-tailed duck drifted off into is the very fine blue line just in front of the cattle on the far left.

I left the hide and walked back to the path by the road, scanning that back channel every so often to see if the changes of angle would help me find the long-tailed duck. It was only when I reached the top of the slope by the road that I was seeing enough of the channel to find my target. At first I dismissed the tiny silhouette as either a teal or a moorhen but neither of them are notable for their diving ability. It took a few minutes but I eventually saw enough of the bird to properly identify it as the long-tailed duck but I'd only been able to do so because I knew it was there and I was specifically searching for it. Had I not known beforehand I'd have missed it. I want a better sighting than that of a long-tailed duck before the year's out.

Pink-footed geese, Marshside

The walk down to Crossens as the clouds rolled in was quietly productive. There were more ducks, geese and waders on Marshside Inner Marsh. Marshside Outer Marsh looked empty until you saw the heads of the pink-footed geese on sentry-go in the tall grass in the distance. A couple of black-headed gulls and a little egret were on the pools. Somebody had reported a snow goose on the inner marsh but the only white birds I was finding were mute swans, little egrets or herring gulls. Ah well, mustn't be greedy.

Looking over Marshside and Crossens outer marshes to the Pennines

I can never remember what this toadstool's called but they always catch my eye

Crossens Inner Marsh 

Crossens Inner Marsh was carpeted with lapwings, black-tailed godwits, golden plovers and wigeon. I was feeling greedy and told myself that this would be a good time of year to be finding an American golden plover in the crowd. The more rational side of me pointed out I didn't have a snowball's chance of finding one at that distance amongst a mass of silhouettes. A few skylarks, linnets and meadow pipits flitted about, greenfinches and wrens called in the hawthorns and when the merlin shot by at chest height none of the small birds took a blind bit of notice.

Crossens Outer Marsh and great white egret 

Crossens Outer Marsh looked empty at first sight, just a few distant little egrets and great white egrets and an indistinct line of Canada geese grazing on the far salt marsh. Waves of pink-footed geese flew in to join them and one of them caught my eye because there was something white in there. Which turned out to be a snow goose. The geese joined the distant Canada geese, the pink-feet shuffling into the long grass, the snow goose hanging about for a couple of minutes before joining them. So that's where it was, then.

Little egret, Crossens Outer Marsh 

Little egret, Crossens Outer Marsh 

The creeks by the old wildfowlers' pull-in were busy with egrets, both little and great white. They didn't mind the traffic but they didn't like me walking past and retreated a few hundred yards away before returning once I'd passed. For once there were only a couple of shelducks out there.

Great white egret, Crossens Outer Marsh 

Great white egret, Crossens Outer Marsh 

Water pipit, Crossens Outer Marsh 

I always check the muddy grass around the concrete water trough a little way further down for wagtails and pipits. Which was as well as a pied wagtail and a water pipit were sitting on the trough.

Wigeons and lapwings, Crossens Inner Marsh 

Wigeons, Crossens Inner Marsh 

Wigeons, Crossens Inner Marsh 
Spot the teal.

I crossed the road to walk back into Marshside along the bund. Luckily enough even though this stretch of walk is very exposed it was sheltered from the wind by the houses and trees on the inland side. The ducks were very skittish, particularly the wigeons, which is unfortunate as there's no way not to be on the skyline as you're walking the bund. Nearly all the drake wigeons so far had moulted into breeding plumage but there were still a fair few on this marsh hanging onto their gingery eclipse plumage. The golden plovers were still distant but at least now weren't in silhouette. I only found a couple of redshanks, there were a handful of ruff out there. All along down this stretch there was a background chatter of whistling wigeons, teal and godwits.

Golden plovers, Crossens Inner Marsh 

Canada geese, Marshside

Greylags, Marshside 

Canada geese, greylags and black-tailed godwits, Marshside 

Walking through to Marshside Inner I had a bit of a suprise. There, amongst a crowd of Canada geese, greylags and black-tailed godwits jostling amongst the grazing cattle was a snow goose. We looked at each other for a good minute. I tried to move along a bit so I could get a photo of it in profile, it shuffled round so it could keep an eye on me. I put the camera away and it started grazing again. It's a funny business the birdwatching lark.

Snow goose and Canada geese, Marshside

Snow goose and Canada geese, Marshside

Snow goose and Canada geese, Marshside

Snow goose and Canada geese, Marshside

Snow goose and wigeon, Marshside

Snow goose and Canada geese, Marshside
When you see one sideways on amongst Canada geese you realise the snow goose is relatively small and compact, not unlike a pink-footed goose.

Snow goose and Canada geese, Marshside

Snow goose, Marshside