One of them days.

A hot, sunny day started with swifts whirling round the front garden.

I got the train into Manchester and bought my tickets to Southport, the idea being that now I know my dad's ready for coming home from hospital in a day or two I could try and beat the heat with a day at the seaside, have a look round Marshside to see what's about and generally decompress after a pretty intense couple of weeks.

So I got the 'phone call telling me that he was coming out today just as I was stepping into the train. I'm glad he's well and able to come home but it would have been nice to have had a day out. The next few days will be largely focused on making sure he doesn't try to rush back into business as usual. I have no need to wonder where my impatience comes from.

Cob Kiln Wood

Cob Kiln Wood 

The robin joining the woodpigeons and collared dove in the quite-a-while-after-dawn chorus was a nice surprise, and yet another turn in the seasonal wheel. The appearance of a brand new, not especially good at flying, young robin at the bird bath was a bigger surprise. The sneaky devils!

I'd hoped that the rain first thing might freshen up the day instead the morning felt like a Turkish bath. And then the day grew hotter. I paid my daily visit and decided against a walk. Even the pigeons were hiding behind chimneys to keep out of the sun.

I decided on an evening walk, just to get some exercise, and I stuck the bat detector in my pocket, just in case. By the time I was listening to the parakeets going to roost by the allotments and the woodpigeons singing from the rooftops I wondered if I'd made a wise decision, it was still very warm indeed.

The sun was setting as I reached Cob Kiln Wood and the air felt cooler and smelled of loam and white poplars. Magpies rattled in the trees and woodpigeons grazed in the fields. An occasional tut in the bushes told me I'd just gone past a robin. The last of the lesser black-backs were heading to the Salford Quays roost. It was a dead clear and bright twilight and the yellow underwing moths were flitting about the trees in the clearing. Some large moths up in the tree canopy were unidentifiable silhouettes. I had no luck finding any bats, the only signals being the interference as I walked by the electricity pylons.

A walk down to the river found some woodpigeons having one last drink for the road and a heron settling down for some night fishing by the salmon ladder.

I walked down Cob Kiln Lane into Urmston. More magpies rattled, the last woodpigeons went to roost and the robins started singing. It had been a dead quiet walk but a pleasant one nonetheless.

A canalside dawdle

Mallards

The morning started with the first three-figure flock of black-headed gulls I've seen on the school playing field in ages. A hundred and thirty-five of them, all panting in the heat of the morning.

It was a hot and cloudy day, I'd had a busy morning and I'd decided to get the hospital visit done and dusted before going for a walk (patient almost ready to come home, thanks for asking). Coming out I played bus stop bingo: if the 20 came I'd most likely go for a walk over Cutacre, if anything went to the Trafford Centre I'd get a bus into Chorlton for a walk in the Mersey Valley. I didn't want a walk over the mosses in this weather. So the 35 to Leigh turned up first. Whenever I aim to catch that I'm unlucky. Anyhow, the rules of the game is the rules of the game so I got on and started wondering where I was going. I didn't want another visit to Pennington Flash so soon after the last one. It was too warm to explore whether that path in Alder Forest really does lead to Botany Bay Wood. Worsley Woods would be busy with people and barren of birds. I could have a wander over Bickershaw Country Park or that walk from Worsley to Astley…

I got off at Butts Bridge in Leigh and walked down the Bridgewater Canal to Astley.

Blue-tailed damselfly 

The canalside house sparrows flitted to and fro and a few mallards loafed about. A coal tit called loudly from a garden corner. Electric blue lights zipped about the canal surface. A couple were common blue damselflies going about their business. The vast majority were blue-tailed damselflies. Nearly all the butterflies were large whites, and there were plenty of them. Given the abundance of blackberries and nettles I was surprised only to see singles of red admiral and speckled wood.

Canal Turn 

South of the canal

The barley fields between the canal and the East Lancs Road were ripe and golden and full of woodpigeons. At first glance there'd just be a few of them flying around. Every so often a bird-scaring device would go off and there'd be an eruption from the depths, crowds of woodpigeons taking to the air, and just as suddenly disappearing back into the fields. Every so often there'd be an occasional carrion crow or a couple of jackdaws, just to relieve the monotony.

I carried on along the canal. Moorhens puttered about the water's edge. Chiffchaffs, great tits and robins were squeaks in wayside bushes. Woodpigeons barged about in hawthorn bushes. Just as I'd given up on swifts or hirundines a couple of sand martins passed overhead. Swallows hawked over the canalside houses of Marsland Green and crowds of house sparrows bustled about in brambles. Somewhere over by the East Lancs Road a juvenile buzzard shouted for its dinner.

Bridgewater Canal 

A Southern hawker passed by, pausing only to come over and see if I was a thing. Brown hawkers are, for me, the archetypal canal dragonfly and sure enough, there they were chasing each other around bankside trees.

Arrowhead

A willow warbler called, appropriately enough, from a stand of willows. Great tits, chiffchaffs and robins squeaked, wrens churred, blue tits and long-tailed tits passed like shadows through the hedgerows.

Astley Green 

My approaching Astley Green coincided with flocks of starlings joining the woodpigeons in the fields, a flock of swallows hawking low over the canal, and robins and collared doves singing in the trees.

I got to Astley Green in time to see the departure of the 553 bus. I wasn't going to wait an hour for the next one and I didn't have the legs for walking down to Boothstown. Walking over the steep bridge over the canal I wondered if I'd have the legs for walking into Astley, and might have opted for sitting out that hour by the canalside watching the house martins flit by if I hadn't forgotten I'd have to cross the East Lancs Road en route. But I did forget, and I did walk into Astley and the 126 to the Trafford Centre arrived at the Coach Road bus stop the same time I did.

Flycatching

I'm pretty sure it isn't flying ant season but judging by the crowds of gulls circling about today there must have been a mass emergence of something small. I first noticed a couple of dozen gulls — mostly lesser black-backs with a few black-headed gulls — in a feeding frenzy flying high over Davyhulme Circle as I waited for the bus. Fifty-odd lesser black-backs were circling over the Trafford Centre with a similarly sized flock of black-headed gulls over Barton Bridge. Getting off at Salford Royal there were a couple of dozen lesser black-backs. Times like this you wish you'd brought your binoculars with you when hospital visiting. It would be just my luck for a YLG or a Med gull to be in the crowds.

Home thoughts

I had a pile of things to do today but it turned out that the thing I really had to do was get some sleep: I'll get up in a minute I told myself at seven and suddenly it was quarter past twelve.

I'd refilled the seed feeders in the back and the spadgers were doing their best to empty them just as quickly. Just lately I'm just seeing the one goldfinch and one coal tit on the feeders, the blue tits and great tits come in as pairs. I've not seen the dunnocks for yonks, I'm not often down at the bottom of the garden where they generally lurk amongst the ivy and geraniums. On the other hand the robin is asserting its territorial rights with increased urgency, making sure none of the young birds try to take over.

It was evening when I came back from hospital visiting. Dozens of lesser black-backs flew East over the Trafford Centre, presumably heading for the roost in Salford Quays. Lesser black-backs are the Summer large gull round these parts though I've noticed an increase in herring gulls over the years. This Summer there seems to be more lesser black-backs than ever, they seem to have had a good season in Trafford Park. Traffic was delayed a bit while a gaggle of Canada geese occupied one of the yellow boxes on the road, unsure whether to graze the verges or the roundabout.

Walking home through Lostock Park it was very quiet. In May or June the songbirds would have been gearing up for a twilight chorus, in August a woodpigeons sang from the top of the poplars and magpies rattled, as much in protest at the racket a squirrel was making as the cat that provoked it.

A Stretford sunset.

As I got home a lone parakeet made a racket as it flew overhead to roost somewhere or other in the Mersey Valley. I wouldn't have imagined ever writing that five years ago.

Mosses

Buzzard and starlings, Cadishead Moss

I felt I needed a proper walk on a warm, cloudy day. I decided I'd go and look for dragonflies on the mosses, on the assumption that if I look for them the birds might volunteer to show themselves. The target was to find three species of darter and three of hawker.

I got the 100 from Salford to Cutnook Lane and crossed over the motorway. The turf field on the left was peppered with black-headed gulls and lesser black-backs. Woodpigeons and carrion crows mingled with the horses on Oxcheek Farm but only the one swallow flitted about. It was a quiet walk down the road, a couple of chiffchaffs squeaked, a cormorant flew overhead and a brown hawker patrolled the bracken on the edge of the birch scrub.

Walking up to Croxden's 

A crowd of common darters zipped about at knee height at the intersection with Twelve Yards Road. The walk up to Croxden's was a lot quieter than last time, or would have been if a young buzzard deep in the trees hadn't been begging so loudly. A reed bunting shot across into the rough pasture by the road. Chiffchaffs, wrens and willow warblers tutted me on my way as I passed them. Woodpigeons and swallows passed overhead. A scan through the birch scrub at the pools couldn't even find a mallard.

Marsh thistle
Marsh thistle's a tricky plant to photograph as it's just yards of stem with random flowers at the end so I concentrated on the flowers.

The crows on Croxden's were heard but not seen. Which is more than anything else was.

Common blue damselfly
This has me baffled and I had to ask for help.

I walked back and joined the rough path through the trees. Speckled woods and large whites fluttered about the undergrowth. Black darters and common darters tended to favour the easy pickings over the stands of Himalayan balsam. It was thin pickings for birds, just the squeaks of chiffchaffs and willow warblers in the trees and the challenge of telling one from another. A couple of willow warblers made it easier by breaking into song. Wrens tutted from the depths of nettles and even the magpies were seen but not heard.

Common darter

The path widened and gatekeepers joined the speckled woods in the margins. A mixed tit flock — blue tits, great tits and long-tailed tits broke cover to flit between trees. A couple of emerald damselflies danced over the bracken, there's no other way of describing their flight, it makes a crane fly look purposeful. It took me far too long to be sure that the dragonfly patrolling the fringes of the trees was a common hawker.

There was nothing doing on the pools North of the path though I could hear carrion crows and magpies out in the open country. My stopping to scan a pool through a gap in the birch scrub irritated a pair of sedge warblers which flew up into the trees to scold me on my way. 

Meadow brown showing how the sudden appearance of that eye spot might disconcert a predator

The path broadened still more and the scrubby woodland to the South gave way to barley fields. Meadow browns and a red admiral joined the butterfly mix. Brown hawkers patrolled the bracken and brambles. Linnets and goldfinches flew overhead and into the barley. Woodpigeons clattered about. A yellowhammer surprised me by singing a snatch of song from the depths of the barley. Swallows zipped about and a flock of a dozen swifts hawked and swooped over a field recently vacated by horses.

Chat Moss 

I turned onto the path to Twelve Yards Road, disturbing a couple of buzzards digging for insects in the dung heap on the corner. I'd been little bothered by horseflies so far this time, a few cleggs tried to spoil things and were quickly dispatched. A Southern hawker patrolling the hawthorn hedge came over to check me out before going back to the hunt.

The distressing sound of heavy industrial machinery turned out to be a tiny tractor doing a hay cut on the rough pasture opposite Four Lanes End. I walked down Lavender Lane where the only whitethroats of the day churred my passing. A male kestrel hovered over the field to the North, a female kestrel over the field to the South and a young kestrel sat on the telegraph wires by Four Lanes End. 

Heather

A migrant hawker patrolled the clearing by the entrance to Little Woolden Moss. Robins and willow warblers squeaked in the trees, one of the willow warblers sang. It was dead quiet out in the open moss, a family of carrion crows were the only birds on the dried-up pools. 

Little Woolden Moss 

Woodpigeons passed overhead and small flocks of swallows and swifts drifted by, keeping to treetop height. The wind was blowing cool and all the dragons and damsels had retreated into cover. A gatekeeper fluttering in the heather raised my hopes for my first large heath of the year for a moment.

There was a linnet there a moment ago 

I decided to walk down Moss Road into Irlam. There wasn't a lot of birds in the fields, most of them carrion crows and woodpigeons. A young pied wagtail glowed white against the black of a ploughed field. I stopped and scanned the field and as I got my eye in I found there was a couple of dozen pied wagtails on there. There was more birdlife around the farmsteads with house sparrows, collared doves and blackbirds in the hedgerows, linnets and swarms of swallows about the farm buildings. Just before the motorway a crowd of starlings shared the telegraph lines with a buzzard. Not a chance they'd have stuck around had it been a falcon or sparrowhawk.

Collared doves

I asked myself if I had the legs for a wander round New Moss Wood and the answer was no so I walked down through the allotments for the bus back to the Trafford Centre. I'd found two species of darter and four of hawker. I've still not managed to see any ruddy darters this year.

Pennington Flash

Kingfisher 

It was one of those mornings where whatever you chose to wear it would be wrong. Twice. I got the 35 from Salford to Leigh, only realising near the end of the journey that I was wearing shoes, not boots. No matter, a wander round Pennington Flash doesn't have to be a wild walk.

Goldcrest

A couple of robins were gearing up for song in the trees by St Helens Road. This is the time of year when juveniles are on the move hoping to find a des res with vacant possession. Further along most of the furtive rustlings in the hedgerows were the wind catching dead leaves. Every so often  there might have been a blue tit or great tit, or was that a robin? I was more sure of my ground when a goldcrest poked its head out of a blackthorn, whistled then flew across the path to rummage about in one of the tall hawthorns.

That green path is the brook

The brook was opaque, an algal bloom rendering it a green soup.

Juvenile coot

The whole gang were out on the car park taking advantage of a sunny school holiday afternoon. The hordes of young Canada geese — each one a three-quarter-sized edition of the adults — was a bit unnerving. The young coots haven't all their flight feathers yet but that didn't stop them trying to take off from bankside rocks. The mute swans were being a bit stand-offish, there were too many dogs and small children for their liking. I searched in vain for any Egyptian geese. I also had a look out for the car park oystercatcher, out of habit as much as anything else. I think he's either passed on or tagged along with the oystercatchers passing through on Spring.

Out on the flash there were large rafts of coots and mallards, rafts of black-headed gulls and, out in midwater, rafts of lesser black-backs and herring gulls. A few great crested grebes and tufted ducks drifted in and out of the crowds. A couple of common terns almost got lost in the crowds of black-headed gulls flying about. With all the traffic it would have been easy to miss the swifts and swallows hawking over the flash.

Coots, black-headed gulls,Allard's and mute swan

Herring gull
This time of year subadult herring gulls bleach very pale.

The vegetation on the Horrocks spit could hide a regiment of lapwings and I suspect it did. One flew out of cover to attack a lesser black-back that was minding its own business sitting on a pole. The usual horde of herring gulls and cormorants loafed at the end of the spit.

Lesser black-back and great black-back
I wanted to make this lesser black-back into a yellow-legged gull but it wasn't. It's a relatively pale bird made to look lighter by the way the light hits it and being stood standing next to a great black-back.

Dabchick and chick

It was hard work seeing the water by the Tom Edmondson Hide. Long-tailed tits, chiffchaffs and blue tits bounced about in the waterside vegetation. Groups of mallards and gadwalls drifted about in corners while moorhens and coots fossicked about in the reed margins. I only noticed the heron fishing in the corner by the hide when it stepped out from behind a tree. I spent most of the time watching a dabchick catching tiddlers for its tiny humbug.

Moorhen 

I could see damn all for reeds at Ramsdales.

I took the looping walk round via the canal. Chiffchaffs squeaked in the trees, titmice and blackbirds were furtive, a couple of robins gave bursts of inexpert song.

As the path met Westleigh Brook, by the golf course, I was surprised to hear a kingfisher and the more surprised to see two of them fishing from the bankside willows.

Moorhen, gadwall and mallard

Gadwalls outnumbered mallards two to one at the Charlie Owen Hide. A little egret was woken up by the noisy arrival of a heron. Seeing as how it was awake now it made a bit of effort at stalking by the waterside before going back to sleep again.

Gadwall, little egret, black-headed gull, mallard and heron

Gadwalls 

The feeders at the Bunting Hide were busy with great tits. Chaffinches, dunnocks and great tits raided the bird tables, long-tailed tits decided to stick to foraging for insects in the bushes. A young, and very pale and downy, chiffchaff tagged along with the long-tailed tits but couldn't resist nipping over to one of the tables to see what the great tits were after. It didn't seem to fancy sunflower seeds at all. Oddly there weren't any stock doves about, quite a contrast to the crowds on my last visit.

Chaffinch 

Chaffinch 

Robin

It hasn't felt a particularly busy visit but the day list came to forty-nine species. Which makes it all the more unfortunate those stock doves didn't make an appearance.

Irlam Locks

Juvenile heron

After a sadly eventful day (I had to take the cat to the vet's and come home without her) I was in need of distraction. There was a report that a juvenile shag had been spotted on Irlam Locks. Atlantic storms have a habit of bringing seabirds into odd inland localities and Storm Floris probably brought this waif in its wake.

I got the 256 to Town Gate and walked down Irlam Road to the locks. Woodpigeons and collared doves sang on chimney pots and over a hundred starlings gathered on the lines between the electricity pylons along the canalside. A dozen or so swallows hawked over the fields at chimney top height.

A couple of dozen mallards and seventy-odd black-headed gulls loafed on the locks. There were more black-headed gulls with the magpies on the water treatment works. The cormorants loafing at the head of the locks were all cormorants. A great crested grebe and its big humbug drifted in the water with a group of mallards.

Great crested grebes 

Small birds were settling into the hedgerows for the night and were very put out by my walking by. A couple of blue tits and chiffchaffs joined a couple of dozen long-tailed tits that abandoned an elderflower bush and flew over into the hawthorns further down the road. The spadgers and great tits contented themselves with voicing their displeasure and settling under cover. A very grey-looking chiffchaff would have been worth a second look had it not disappeared deep into a nettle bed.

I looked downstream from the lock. A few dozen pigeons were loafing by the lock prior to going to their roost on the lock gates. A juvenile heron was fishing from the bank on the Flixton side. Further down a couple of moorhens made heavy weather of swimming across the canal while mute swans and mallards cruised about. A pair of great crested grebes and their youngsters dozed by the Irlam bank.

I'd walked over to the Irlam side and was making my way back having had no joy finding the shag on the canal. Then I noticed a cormorant sitting on its own at the downstream end of the lock. It looked skinny and brown like a juvenile shag and the beak had an abrupt meeting with the forehead like a stick in a toffee apple. It would have been nice to have a pigeon or gull nearby to provide a bit of scale. I wasn't in my most confident of moods. I was most of the way to convincing myself that of course it was a shag when it stuck its beak  in its back feathers and went to sleep, putting paid to any counter arguments my doubts might have had to offer.

Irlam Locks 

I walked back for the bus, a couple of dozen swifts joining the swallows that had drifted over to hawk over the canal. Google Maps said I'd have a ten minute wait for the 256 at the terminus, the Bee Network said it would be twenty minutes. The bus was waiting at the stop and set off two minutes later, as per the timetable on the shelter. Sometimes you have to go by your gut instinct.

Greater Manchester bumper bundle

Black-necked grebe, Moses Gate Country Park 

It was one of those windy days where you know it's pouring down because the sun's shining. The business of the day was concluded by lunchtime so I caught the 20 from Salford Royal Hospital and debated whether to get off at Logistics North and risk a walk over Cutgate or stay on to Bolton and go on to Moses Gate Country Park where an adult black-necked grebe was gracing the big lake. In the event, I got off at Walkden and walked up to Blackleach Country Park.

As I walked across the green on Hilltop Road to the entrance to the country park a swarm of swallows flew in and started hawking round the trees, equal numbers of adults and juveniles. I had a bad stab at trying to get photos of them and didn't fare any better with the house martins that flew in and joined them.

Blackleach Country Park 

A chiffchaff squeaked from the trees as I approached the lake. A small charm of goldfinches twittered in the tree tops and a pair of bullfinches wheezed sadly as they flew over the path.

Coots and great crested grebes 

Rafts of coots and mallards drifted over the lake. Most of the mute swans lurked by the pier confident that someone would be along with some scoff. One pair dozed with a couple of large cygnets on the opposite bank. The cob steamed across the lake with all colours flying at the first rustle of a bag of bread. A pair of great crested grebes cruising about amongst the coots had a couple of young humbugs on their backs. Most of the black-headed gulls crowded onto one of the islands, until that bag of bread got rustled.

Black-headed gulls 

Mute swan

Blackleach Country Park 

I walked through to Bolton Road and got the 37 into Farnworth and walked down Lower Rawson Street into Moses Gate Country Park.

Moses Gate Country Park 

Of course, I forgot that this way in involves a steep but very picturesque path down to the lakes.

Moses Gate Country Park 

The first of the two smaller lakes was busy with coots and mallards. That is, until the rusty brown face of a mink broke water near the far bank and started making a beeline for the nearest raft of coots. They had it spotted fifty yards away and all the waterfowl save a couple of mute swans swiftly shifted over to the other side of the lake.

There were no such dramas on the water lily lake with its mallards and tufties.

Canada geese, mute swans, mallards, herring gulls, lesser black-backs, coots and moorhens
I've no idea why they like scrunching up together like this in this corral but every time I've been here they've done it. Correlation does not always equal causation.

Moses Gate Country Park 

I walked down to the big lake. "Are you looking for the black-necked grebe?" asked a gent with a big lens on his camera. "It's just next to that willow there."

And so it was.

Black-necked grebe, first sighting

A nice adult black-necked grebe still in breeding colours and entirely unperturbed by people standing on the path twenty yards away watching it fishing.

Mute swan 

Mute swan

It occurred to me that I was fighting the light — despite its being an overcast day — and I'd be better walking down a little beyond the willow and have the sun coming from behind me. Backlighting suits mute swans but not nearly entirely dark-coloured grebes.

Black-necked grebe 

Black-necked grebe 

Black-necked grebe 

Any chance you get to see any species of grebe up close, do so. They're bonny birds.

Coots and great crested grebes, juvenile grebe in the centre

A way further out a great crested grebe was taking its two near-full-grown humbugs for a cruise past the rafts of coots.

Great crested grebes, adult far right

Juvenile great crested grebes and coots

Herring gulls, lesser black-backs, coots and tufted duck

A lack of exercise was telling on that Achilles tendon so I quit while I was ahead and got the 524 into Radcliffe and got a bus home. One of those dull days that aren't dull.