Southport

Snow bunting, Southport 

It was a surprisingly mild and cloudy morning after a clear and cold night. I headed to Southport for a day's wander. For balance's sake let's have it on the record that the trains and buses behaved themselves.

The journey out from Oxford Road as the clouds slowly parted was interesting. The usual trackside corvids and woodpigeons were punctuated quite regularly by buzzards and blackbirds. The lakeside path at Pemberton Park had emerged from the waters but still looked very damp, the lake had small rafts of coots and tufted ducks lurking by the reeds. The usual large flock of black-headed gulls between Parbold and Hoscar was a few fields down from its usual haunt. The rooks were nest building at Burscough Bridge. And the mass of hunched backs in a stubble field near Bescar Lane seemed to be equal numbers woodpigeons and red-legged partridges.

Southport Marine Lake 

Common gull dancing for worms, Southport 

At Southport I walked down to the lake where the usual assemblage of mute swans, Canada geese, herring gulls and black-headed gulls jostled with the pigeons as they mugged for bird food. The crowds put off the few mallards and tufted ducks, the gadwalls were fast asleep and the greylags looked at the whole brouhaha with something like suspicious contempt. The few black-headed gulls and common gulls that didn't join the fray danced for worms in the wet grass.

Greylags, Southport Marine Lake 

Oystercatchers and black-headed gulls 

The tide was out when I got to the beach though it was coming in at a rate of knots, it doesn't mess about as it races across this flat expanse of mud. Cormorants and oystercatchers shuffled from the tideline. More oystercatchers, with shelducks, black-headed gulls, redshanks and dunlins got one last forage in before being moved on and small flocks of ringed plovers headed for the salt marsh at the Birkdale end of the beach. Most of the redshanks headed for the salt marsh North of the pier.

It took me a while to find the snow bunting, she was tucked into the rubbish stacked at the base of the revetment so I couldn't see her from above. She didn't mind my standing and watching her about her business but despite my efforts to keep my distance as I passed by she hopped up onto the revetment just to be on the safe side. I remain surprised she's finding plenty to eat here, it just shows how many seeds and small animals get washed in by the tide.

Snow bunting
This angle emphasises just how short the tail is compared to other buntings.

Snow bunting 

Snow bunting

Snow bunting 

Snow bunting stretch

Snow bunting 

Snow bunting 

Snow bunting 

Snow bunting 

The tide was rushing in as I passed under the pier and the redshanks, dunlins and curlews were retreating into the salt marsh. The only reason I saw the flock of twites at all was that they don't like getting their feet wet so had to keep skipping between tussocks ahead of the tide. It was nice to be close enough to see their pink rumps clearly for a change, from a distance these merge into the brown upperparts. Once they were back down they were just occasional shuffling shadows in the grass.

I crossed over the road to have a nosy at this end of the lake. A crowd of mute swans, gulls and pigeons were being fed over by the roadside jetty. Dabchicks bobbed about by the near bank, a goldeneye and a great crested grebe tagged along with a raft of tufted ducks.

Hesketh Park 

There were more tufted ducks on the lake with a crowd of mallards at Hesketh Park.

Golden plovers, lapwings and black-tailed godwits, Marshside 

I got the bus into Marshside and walked down to the end of Marshside Road. The flooded side of the road was chock-a-block with wigeons and teals, hundreds of golden plovers loafed on mud banks with larger flocks of lapwings and black-tailed godwits beyond them and crowds of gulls further yet. Where the flood became the Junction Pool groups of pintails, shovelers and tufted ducks drifted about and mallards dozed in quiet corners.

Golden plovers

The dry side of the road was quite deserted save a dozen curlews and a small group of wigeons.

The pool by Sandgrounders was a lot quieter than usual, handfuls of gadwall and tufted ducks with a couple of dozen wigeon. A few little egrets fossicked about in the marsh beyond.

Wigeon

It wasn't much busier at Sandgrounders where the wigeon were accompanied by a dozen teal.

Wigeon

I decided to walk round to Crossens Marsh. Well, trudge really, I've not got my legs back properly after a lazy couple of weeks. There wasn't much cover about after extensive scrub clearance so any wildfowl in the drains and gulleys in the inner marsh made themselves scarce as I walked along. A drift of snowdrops had survived the clearing.

Snowdrops 

Pink-footed geese and juvenile spoonbill

At first it didn't look like there was much on the outer marsh aside from the mallards, black-headed gulls and little egrets in the near pools. I soon started to see the tops of heads of the pink-footed geese on sentry go in the distant tall grass and a great white egret raised its neck in the near distance. The further along I walked the closer the geese came in towards the road but none came particularly close. I was very surprised to see a young spoonbill, a first-Winter bird, feeding out there with the geese.

Pink-footed geese 

I wondered what had brought up a flock of skylarks and eventually found the merlin that had settled on a fence post. The skylarks were soon up again as a marsh harrier drifted by, most of the skylarks flew over the road and disappeared into the inner marsh.

Crossens Inner Marsh was busy with teal and wigeons and the usual crowd of black-headed gulls lurked over by the water treatment works. Over the road a few dozen pink-footed geese grazed near the road while further out there were ranks of Canada geese and more pink-feet. Some of the group of Canada geese in the middle distance had dark backs that weren't just a trick of the string, low sunlight, but we're all just variations on a theme of Canada goose, except the barnacle goose with the dark grey back.

Canada geese, Crossens Outer Marsh

About half a mile out another merlin was harassing the small birds in the long grass by the fence, stooping and rising to try and flush them out of cover before diving in and disappearing out of sight.

Something caused a panic out on the outer marsh. Waves of lapwings and golden plovers passed overhead and this spooked the geese which rose and wheeled around, taking a good five minutes to begin settling down, nearly all heading for the long grass. Not much that is airborne is going to put geese up, except low-flying aircraft, so I looked around in vain for the harrier or peregrine that had been the culprit. I saw later that a hen harrier had been seen on the marsh a little earlier so it might have been that. I don't often see Canada geese spooked by marsh harriers though there's nothing to say they didn't just join in a general panic.

Canada geese, pink-footed geese and lapwings

I didn't have the legs for the walk down the bund back into Marshside so I got the bus back into Southport and just managed to catch the train back to Manchester and have plenty of time for the connection back home. It had been a productive day and rather to my surprise I found the year list had hit the hundred mark. I was ready for my tea.

Crossens Inner Marsh