Lazy Friday

Blue tit, Leighton Moss 

Quite what the blackbird was about, starting singing at half three in the morning, but he gave it a good hour before realising he'd set his clock wrong. It won't be long now until the dawn chorus becomes a set feature of the day.

The change in the weather has affected the joints and I've been sleeping badly lately anyway so I wasn't up for anything energetic or strenuous today. I've got a pile of compensatory return train tickets to use up so I decided to employ one on a train ride out to Barrow, have a short fossick round the local park then call in on Leighton Moss on the way back. I'm very aware that I'm short-changing Leighton Moss lately and I intend to make a day of it later in Spring. I was also aware there were a couple of long-tailed ducks at Hodbarrow but with the maintenance work on the Carlisle line it's extremely difficult to make the connections: the train as far as Corkicle leaves just before the Manchester train arrives and it runs every couple of hours. Extremely difficult but not impossible, I might revisit this when the get up and go hasn't got up and gone.

The train journey up was fine. Woodpigeons abounded at the trackside, along with carrion crows, magpies and jackdaws. Black-headed gulls no longer lingered in town centres, herring gulls only became a feature after Preston, rookeries were busy and the sparrows were nesting again in that roof by Chorley Station.

The pools by the coastal hides at Leighton Moss were busy with black-headed gulls. Wigeons, black-tailed godwits and teal littered the pool by the Eric Morecambe Hide, mute swans cruised, little egrets loafed and there was much else I couldn't register as the train went by.

The Kent at Arnside was quiet, the salt marshes on the other side were busy. Teals dabbled in pools, curlews roosted, carrion crows and black-headed gulls rummaged about, little egrets skulked in creeks, shelducks dabbled on the shores. As the train crossed the Leven the oystercatchers outnumbered the wigeons two to one and there was still no sign of any eiders. The rookeries of Cumbria were as bustling as those of Lancashire but there were far more herring gulls about and many looked like they'd chosen their rooftop nesting places.

The herring gulls of Barrow Station were a little camera shy

Barrow Station was very busy with herring gulls and lesser black-backs. I had forty minutes to wait for the train back to Silverdale so I ambled round the corner to Barrow Park. 

Barrow Park 

It's a nice walk, even on a cool and grey day, and the usual array of urban park bird life was making itself known. Blackbirds and robins fussed about in borders; goldfinches, woodpigeons and collared doves sang; I didn't really have the time for the walk down to the ponds and to be honest the knees were complaining about the steps down from the war memorial so I toddled back to the station for the ten-minute wait for the train.

Walking down from the war memorial 

Dunnock

At Leighton Moss I went straight to the Hideout to see what was on the feeders. A crowd of chaffinches almost monopolised the feeders, even the greenfinches got crowded out most of the time. A pair of marsh tits kept striking picturesque poses in a blackthorn bush but were resolutely against having their photos taken. Some of the other small birds were a bit more obliging.

Coal tit

Chaffinch

Blue tit

Chaffinch

I wandered over to Lilian's Hide where the black-headed gulls were in a noisy mood. In striking contrast to my last few visits not a duck was loafing on the near bank. A raft of tufted ducks mingled with a few pochards and a drake goldeneye over the far side. Coots, moorhens and teals bimbled about the reed edges. Half a dozen snipe slept by the reeds near the hide. A jack snipe had been reported earlier but I couldn't see it here. Four marsh harriers floated over the reeds, two males and two females but not convincingly two pairs. One of the males circled high up into the air but didn't indulge in the hoped-for bit of skydancing.

At Lilian's Hide 

Dawdling back to the visitor centre 

I dawdled back to the visitor centre and thence to the station for the train back, stopping by the car park to watch a pair of carrion crows rush a buzzard out of their territory. The journey back was good and I got home ready for a pot of tea and a chip butty after somehow accumulating fifty-odd species on the day's tally.