Amberswood

Goldcrest

It was another eye-blastingly bright grey day and cool with it. I seriously considered making an early day of it, getting the train at the crack of dawn, but as by that time I had literally not had a wink of sleep I wondered if this was wise. I fell asleep soon after and got a good hour and a half in before the first 'phone call of the day. Thus refreshed, I drank rather a lot of tea and set off to play bus station bingo at the Trafford Centre. Which is how I ended up on the 132 to Wigan. The options were: get off at Sale Lane and get the V1 into Leigh and thence Pennington Flash, get off at Tyldesley or Atherton and walk over to Cutacre or stay on to Hindley for a wander round Amberswood. The last was the easiest option so that's the one I took.

I got off at the Gregory Street bus stop and joined the path into Amberswood. Robins sang in the hedgerows and woodpigeons clattered about as they tried to pluck acorns from the ends of twigs in the oak trees. At first I thought it was going to be another uncannily quiet walk then I started to pick up an occasional house sparrow or goldfinch in the bushes. I was about a hundred yards down when I started to hear long-tailed tits in the trees. I was in luck, they were coming my way and they stopped to look and tell me what they thought of me. It turned out that they were the rear end of a mixed tit flock consisting of a few great tits, a couple of very elusive blue tits and there was another family of long-tailed tits in the vanguard. I wasn't sure whether or not the willow tit churring at me from a gorse bush was one of the flock or a random bystander,

Amberswood
The path from Manchester Road 

There's a willow tit in there somewhere 

I bumped into another mixed tit flock as the path approached the lake and this sort of merged into the flurry of activity at the lakeside feeders. The most conspicuous bird was a male coal tit that spent most of its time striking poses and calling then ducking under cover whenever the camera got into focus. I decided that I didn't have a chance with the siskins that were bouncing round in the alders then a group of them went down for a drink and I managed a couple of photos with birds in them. A goldcrest was a lot more obliging.

Siskin

All the while a Cetti's warbler was singing in the reeds near by. I'd walked down a little to try and get photos of the long-tailed tits that were swinging about in a willow tree when the warbler jumped up into view, sang, then disappeared back into the reeds. The photo I snatched in response won't win any prizes but it's nice to be able to prove that there is a bird involved rather than some taped replay hidden in the depths for a jape.

Cetti's warbler

Amberswood Lake 

A couple of minutes later there was further surprise when the latest candidate for the last dragonfly of the year turned out to be a Norfolk hawker of all things. It obligingly settled down for a moment before getting back to patrolling the reeds, every so often dashing by me at eye height but not stopping to eyeball me like Southern hawkers do.

Norfolk hawker

Jays screeched and magpies rattled in the oak trees. More siskins flew about, a flock of goldfinches passed overhead, chiffchaffs and chaffinches squeaked from the trees while wrens and robins sang from the undergrowth, A nuthatch called from somewhere, its call oddly echoed by the Cetti's warbler. I'd walked about a hundred yards when I bumped into another Norfolk hawker. This was involved in a dogfight with a Southern hawker over a midgey puddle of a pool by the pathside. The Norfolk hawker disengaged first and flew off over the reeds leaving the Southern hawker as the latest last dragonfly of the year.

Two pairs of great crested grebes cruised the lake. A few black-headed gulls bathed and loafed and a pair of mute swans loafed on the mown grass at the far end. It took me a while to find any coots and quite a bit longer to find the mallards, moorhens and the lone drake tufted duck. A heron lurked in the corner where the path splits for Platt Bridge and Liverpool Road.

Heron
We pretended we hadn't noticed each other.

Most of the fire in the landscape was provided by oak trees

Amberswood lake

Low Hall

I headed for Liverpool Road, crossed over and had half an hour's wander round Low Hall, taking the path that meanders round the pond. There were more mallards on here and they weren't lurking under the banks. A pair of mute swans had parked themselves there to have a preen. I'd hoped there might be some teal on here but not today. A skein of pink-footed geese flew high overhead, calling all the while.  

Honey fungus (Armillaria)

As I walked around I bumped into another mixed tit flock, a family party of long-tailed tits with half a dozen blue tits and a pair of great tits. A migrant hawker became the last last dragonfly of the year of the day.

Amberswood Lake 

I walked back to Amberswood and completed the circuit of the lake, disturbing a water rail which was feeding in one of the gaps in the reeds. It flew like a shot into the depths of the reeds and made pig noises at me. I took the paths taking me up towards town centre end of Liverpool Road, bumping into another mixed tit flock along the way, and didn't have long to wait for the 132 back to the Trafford Centre where a skein of seventy pink-feet passed overhead as I waited for the bus home.