Stalybridge

Juvenile grey wagtail, Walkerwood Reservoir 

I'm still in a filing-in-the-gaps mood so I headed off over to Stalybridge Country Park, getting the 343 from Stalybridge up to the bottom of Brushes Road. I looked at the weather and listened to the clicking of the joints and decided that whatever else I was doing with the day I wouldn't be walking over the tops to Tintwistle.

While I was waiting for the bus I spent a few minutes watching the sand martins visiting their drainpipe nests on the Tame before wandering over to the bus stop by the canal and its crowd of Canada geese, mallards, pigeons and pied wagtails.

Stalybridge Country Park 

The clouds looked ominous as I got off the bus and walked up Brushes Road to the entrance to Stalybridge Country Park. The jackdaws and spadgers along the were noisy and busy, every other rooftop had one or other fussing about.

Great tit

The woodland was lush and noisy with robins, blackbirds, blackcaps and chiffchaffs and there was the constant soft calling between families of blue tits and great tits and the objections of wrens to old men passing by. I knew I was getting close to the reservoir when I started hearing willow warblers singing in the trees.

Juvenile grey wagtail 

It started raining when I reached Walkerwood Reservoir. Luckily I had my cap on. A family of grey wagtails pottered about the water's edge and a very fidgety pied wagtail flitted between the banks on the corner. A couple of black-headed gulls floated aimlessly over the reservoir and a lone Canada goose dozed over on the far bank.

Walkerwood Reservoir 

Brushes Road 

I carried on up Brushes Road, I decided I'd go past Brushes Cottages to the bend where you get first sighting of Brushes Reservoir and call it quits. The songs of the birds in the trees on the reservoir banks on the right were joined by the goldfinches, greenfinches and dunnocks in the bushes on the hillside on the left. The woodpigeons that weren't disbudding bilberries and elderflowers were rummaging about on the grass with the sheep. A buzzard rose over the hilltop trees and slowly drifted back over the crest like a child's balloon in the breeze.

Bilberry 

Walking back down to Brushes Cottages 

Jays flitted silently across the road above the cottages. Small birds noticed and objected volubly. I had my look at Brushes Reservoir, just so I could say I'd got this far and made my way back down the road.

A young kestrel, all ginger and black bars, shot across the hillside and disappeared into the trees. Nothing reacted to it. I'd been seeing and hearing young robins all down the road. At the corner by the dam I had a look over Walkerwood Reservoir and a family of them came to have a look at me. I tried to get their photos but had to make do with the treecreeper rummaging about behind them.

Treecreeper 

Treecreeper

Rather than walking back through Stalybridge Country Park I walked down Besom Lane into Millbrook for the bus. The hedgerows were busy with greenfinches, house sparrows and robins.

Besom Lane 

I didn't have long to wait for the 343 bus. I spent the time watching the jackdaws cavorting in the chimney pots.

Stalybridge Country Park
The path is lined with butterburs.