Stretford Meadows

Stretford Meadows 

A grey dawn gave me an excuse to turn over in bed and get another hour's sleep in, to be awoken by a combination of a cat demanding breakfast and a couple of parakeets having a shouting match with a rook somewhere outside.

I felt unaccountably tired and really didn't want to do anything with what was turning into a fitfully sunny day. I certainly didn't have the energy for any of the options I had pencilled in for the day. I'd still be lolling about had the cat not staged an intervention and demanded to know why I wasn't playing out on such a nice day. Actually, she demanded I vacate her sofa so she could have a kip but it amounts to the same thing. Needless to say, the moment I crossed the threshold it clouded over.

I was feeling a bit woodland walked out, which is a shame as we have plenty of them, so I drifted over to Stretford Meadows. The big surprise of the day was that despite all the recent rain only one pallette was necessary to bridge the mud at the Newcroft Road entrance.

Stretford Meadows 

I had an aimless wander round to see what was about. Robins sang in the trees near the nursery; at least four Winter territories sound to be being set up. Great tits, blue tits and wrens bustled through the undergrowth here and the flock of spadgers was back in the hedgerow. Magpies flitted about in the open spaces, dunnocks lurked in the oak saplings and goldfinches flitted between the trees. It was nice to see a linnet flying into a stand of great willowherbs, I've not seen them often here this year. Overhead was the usual steady traffic of carrion crows and jackdaws and rather fewer than usual woodpigeons. I nearly missed a stock dove, thinking it was just another pigeon.

All the oak saplings were planted by jays, no plastic tubing necessary.

The most conspicuous birdlife was the noisy flock of parakeets which wheeled about the trees by the cricket pitch. I was standing on a hill in a very Autumnal English meadow watching parakeets flying about yellowing sycamores. When I was a kid the shopping malls and car parks were green fields brim with lapwings, partridges and skylarks and these meadows were the municipal tip. And now there are parakeets. Funny how things work out.

Stretford Meadows
That's one of the stands of great willowherbs behind the sapling.

The brambles have coloured up splendidly 

I took the long way home, going into Flixton to buy some Spring bulbs. As I came out of the garden centre forty-six pink-footed geese flew overhead.

As I arrived at Humphrey Park Station two pipistrelle bats fluttered over platform two. Funny how things work out.