Marbury and the flashes

Goldcrest, Marbury Country Park 

It was a cool, grey morning with a biting wind. I'd decided it was high time I went for a wander round Marbury Country Park and the Northwich flashes. Oddly, I found an early report of a couple of black-necked stilts on Ashton's Flash a bit off-putting, which is ridiculous, they're lovely birds to see. I stuck to the plan, noticing along the way that the reports of the birds were jumping between the flashes and Budworth Mere. Whatever. I was going for my walk and it might or might not involve stilts.

The choice, as always was to get the Chester train to Northwich and walk up or the 9a bus from Warrington straight to the entrance to Marbury Country Park. Trains and buses being as they are, there's a fifty minute wait for the 9a in Warrington but it's a simpler and more reliable connection for me than trying to get the Chester train and I can hit the ground running, so that's what I chose.

I got off the bus at Marbury Hall Nurseries and had a quick glance over the road at Kennel Wood where the woodpigeons and jackdaws were flying around and blackbirds, chiffchaffs, willow warblers and robins sang.

Marbury Country Park 

There was more of the same as I entered the country park and walked through the arboretum to Budworth Mere. Blackcaps, robins and wrens predominated but had plenty of competition from chiffchaffs, blackbirds and nuthatches. Blue tits and goldcrests quietly sang to themselves in the trees, great tits scolded passersby and dunnocks silently skittered around under bushes. It was a tad busy.

Dunnock

Budworth Mere 

It was damned cold by Budworth Mere, the wind was Skegness bracing. This didn't stop a reed warbler singing in the reeds, nor any of the other warblers singing in the trees by the mere. Tufted ducks, coots and mallards cruised about, great crested grebes dozed in small groups and a kingfisher shot across the water into the trees on the opposite bank. Midway across the opposite bank Canada geese and greylags loafed in the company of a bunch of lesser black-backs and a couple of shelducks. A few black-headed gulls flew about and a common tern fished just offshore.

Mallards

Tufted duck on a choppy mere

Bluebells,  Wood 

I wandered on and into Big Wood as the sun started to flirt with the idea of making a sustained appearance. The birdsong continued with song thrushes, chaffinches, goldfinches and greenfinches joining the chorus. A treecreeper kept coming down to the path to collect nesting materials, zipping off every time the camera got it in focus. I gave up after a couple of minutes, I was too close to the nest for both our comfort.

Bluebells and windflowers

A chap told me to look out for a green woodpecker in the field on the other side of Big Wood and I thanked him greatly. We don't get a lot of green woodpeckers round our way and I've yet to get one on the year list. I turned and headed for the field, past carpets of bluebells and a mistle thrush singing in the trees.

Blackcap

Marbury Country Park 

A whitethroat sang in a hawthorn bush as I reached the path that runs between the wood and the field and  I started scanning round. I kept finding the same woodpigeons, mistle thrush and magpie. I know from experience that though green woodpeckers are big and bright lime green with red splashes about the face they can be surprisingly inconspicuous when they're pillaging ants' nests so I kept looking. Walking down a bit there were carrion crows and rabbits, then a song thrush bounced through the patches of sedge in a field of rough pasture, and then a couple of blackbirds. Then I heard a green woodpecker. The yaffling call was coming from round the corner, stage left. I walked round and scanned that corner of the field. Another magpie. The yaffling resumed, this time from the trees I'd just left behind. I gave it another couple of goes and packed in trying to see the beggar. A call counts for the year list.

Heading for Marbury Lane 

I crossed the canal and walked down onto Marbury Lane. The songscape continued unabated in the trees. A pair of mallards supervised their ducklings from a distance on one of the little ponds, the adults in one corner and the ducklings in another. 

By Marbury Lane 

The sun came out in earnest and all the blackbirds singing in the hedgerows kicked the volume up several notches. Speckled woods, orange tips and brimstones started to flutter along the hedgerows and grassy verges. I noticed some stock doves in a field by the lane. I don't often get the chance to take photos of stock doves close up except at Pennington Flash, here was an opportunity to get some more. One posed obligingly, the sun catching the iridescent green and purple patch on its neck. The camera battery said no, and I'd left the spare battery at home. On the plus side this surely guaranteed I'd get cracking views of the stilts.

Ashton's Flash 

The stilts had been on Ashton's Flash all afternoon so I headed straight there. I walked up to the viewpoint and had a look round. There were mallards, Canada geese, greylags and coots on the pool in the centre of the flash. A bit more searching found some shelducks, teal and moorhens. Half a dozen lesser black-backs stood aloof from half a dozen herring gulls and a handful of black-headed gulls steered clear of both. Reed buntings and reed warblers sang in the reedy scrub and lapwings chased jackdaws off the flash, temporarily. No sign of stilts. There was a group of birdwatchers on the bund between Neumann's Flash and Ashton's Flash and it looked like they had the shallow scrape in the corner in their sights so I walked round.

Ashton's Flash 

"Any luck?" I asked a birdwatcher I'd let onto earlier. He smiled and nodded at the scrape. Mallards, lapwings, oystercatchers… and there in plain sight not fifty yards away a pair of black-necked stilts. They are very lovely birds to see. Even if your camera battery's flat.

Neumann's Flash 

I went over and had a look at Neumann's Flash, tiptoeing past mallard ducklings on the path to the hide. It was quiet on the flash, perhaps a dozen tufted ducks, a handful of grebes dozing in the distance, a pair of shelducks and a few lesser black-backs having a wash in the corner by the bund. Oh, and a reed warbler singing its heart out just in front of the hide.

Gorse

Checking the buses I found I'd just missed the number 9 back to Warrington so I'd have to walk through to the bus interchange in Northwich to get the 9a which was due in half an hour. This was when I realised I'd never got the 9a back to Warrington and didn't know the way to the interchange. Looking it up I found the quickest way was a path through Carey Park which turned out to be a lot more pleasant than walking down Old Warrington Road as I usually do, and it got me into the town centre a lot quicker and easier, too. I must remember this next time.

I didn't have long to wait for the bus. All day it had struck me that I hadn't seen a single hirundine flying about. As the bus wound its way through Antrobus the natural order of things reasserted itself as an angry swallow chased a jackdaw across the road.

Marbury Country Park

Blue tit

It was another cool, grey day so I thought I'd have a wander round Marbury Country Park then walk into Northwich via the flashes. Just so I don't create any unnecessary suspense in my readers: no, I couldn't find any hawfinches and no, the bittern didn't make an appearance. Not entirely surprising given they can both be very elusive. It was a much-needed good walk nonetheless.

My local train to Warrington is scheduled to arrive just as the bus to Northwich leaves. Even though we arrived five minutes late I still had the best part of an hour to wait for the Cat9a bus which stops at the gates of Marbury Country Park. I wasn't for hanging round the bus station so I walked down into Latchford to catch the bus down there. 

I still had the best of half an hour to wait so I had a dawdle round Causeway Park, one of those little strips of suburban green park with a play area at each end. The combination of back gardens, trees and grass in parks like this can sometimes be quite productive and so it proved today. Goldfinches, greenfinches, robins and song thrushes sang in the trees, dunnocks sang in the bushes by the road and three dozen woodpigeons rummaged about the crocuses under the trees.

Marbury Country Park 

The bus wound its way through the Cheshire Countryside and I got off at Marbury. I wandered over to the play area where hawfinches have been reported regularly all Winter. I found lots of blue tits, blackbirds and song thrushes and the nuthatches were very vocal. No sign of any hawfinches. I think I've got the call memorised — it's one of those thin, quick calls one would naturally assume was a great tit — but I wasn't hearing anything like it and seeing nothing beefier than a greenfinch.

Blackbird
A partially leucistic bird. Another one had white outer tail feathers.

I headed over to the hide on Budworth Mere with no expectation of seeing the bittern that's been reported on and off all Winter. I had a sneaking hope the kingfisher might make an appearance but no joy. A heron rummaged about mostly hidden by reeds. A Cetti's warbler made a dash of song for all of ten seconds then clammed up before I could locate it in the reeds. Mallards, tufties and great crested grebes drifted about on the mere while a crowd of Canada geese outnumbered the raft of a few dozen black-headed gulls over on the far bank. The feeding stations by the hide were fizzing with blue tits, great tits and robins. Couples of coal tits and reed buntings joined the crowd, scattering every so often whenever a grey squirrel bounced in.

Budworth Mere 

Just to be on the safe side I wandered back for a second try at the hawfinches, and had just the same luck. I spent a while dawdling between the play area and the arboretum but it wasn't my day for them.

Stock dove

I meandered over to the woodland hide near the mere. That, too, was busy with birds. The titmice were joined by blackbirds and chaffinches. There were a few punch-ups between the blackbirds, the local resident birds flexing their muscles against the wintering interlopers. A flock of half a dozen stock doves flew in, looking beady eyed and winsome. While I was looking at the birds a couple of squirrels were in the hide, giving me that "You have food" look I get from the cat when I'm trying to eat toast. As it happened, I didn't so they were wasting their time. I suspect it works often, though.

Great tit

The titmice and nuthatches bounced round the treetops of Big Wood, great spotted woodpeckers drummed and woodpigeons gorged themselves on ivy berries. I demonstrated my boundless optimism by scanning the trees for lesser spotted woodpeckers, not that I found any. This is one of the few places I know where you can reasonably try to see one, even though I never have any luck with them. I suspect they're like woodcocks: you don't see them unless you're not looking for them. A buzzard flying through the wood was given a very hard time by a couple of carrion crows and a jackdaw.

Big Wood

I crossed the canal and walked through Dairy House Meadows which was fairly quiet save the handfuls of mallards and coots on the pond.

Neumann's Flash was quiet, too. Pairs of mallards, shovelers and gadwalls dozed on the water while a few Canada geese and coots noisily went about their business.

Neumann's Flash 

As I was looking out over Ashton's Flash a flock of twenty-eight curlews silently flew in and settled by the pool for the evening. That was my cue for checking the bus times, the Cat9 back to Warrington from this side of Northwich has an irregular timetable. I was in luck, I had plenty of time to get to the bus stop by the railway station (I didn't want to get the train back to Manchester because that leaves half an hour later and I'd get snagged up in the city centre rush hour). The bus meandered its way through the Cheshire countryside to Warrington and I got the train home and the promise of a pot of tea.

Marbury and Northwich

Kingfisher, Budworth Mere 

After falling asleep over a tin of beans I got twelve hours' more or less uninterrupted sleep and woke up as stiff as a board but more compos mentis than i have been this past week. I decided I'd walk the stiffness out with a stroll across Marbury Country Park and into Northwich.

The train is scheduled to get into Warrington just as the Northwich bus leaves the station which is annoying but moot as the train's always been delayed ten minutes by late-running express trains. It worked in my favour, though as the next bus to Northwich was the Cat 9a which stops at the entrance to Marbury Country Park. There's not a right lot to do in Warrington if you've fifty minutes to spare (I want to give the exhibition of awful album covers at the Art Gallery a good going-over) so I walked down to Stockton Heath and got the bus there. There were plenty of black-headed gulls and lesser black-backs sitting on lampposts but only a moorhen on the Mersey and a coot on the Ship Canal.

Walking past Marbury Nurseries 

It's only half an hour on the bus to Marbury Country Park, the 9a's a straight run most of its length save a short detour to service Antrobus. I got off the bus and had a quick look over the road at Kennel Wood where the treetops were picked out with woodpigeons then walked into the country park following the path through the nursery car park then alongside the wall and on to the arboretum, for no other reason than I've not gone that way before. In fact it's the first time I've started a walk here instead of ending it and the change in perspective was interesting, and it gave me the chance to look at parts of the park I've skipped by in the past due to lack of time or energy.

Marbury Country Park 

Hawfinches have been being reported by the main car park and one had been reported again this morning so I wandered over to see if I'd have any luck. None whatever. I walked around the car park and the adjoining arboretum a few times but had no luck. There were a couple of big mixed tit flocks with lots of blue tits, great tits and long-tailed tits, a few coal tits and goldcrests and some very vocal nuthatches. Great spotted woodpeckers did the rounds of the bare trees. The chaffinches rummaging around in the beech leaves under the trees were nearly all females. But no hawfinches. "Are you hawfinch spotting?" asked a lady dog walker. "I'm hawfinch missing," I admitted. "There were a lot of people here yesterday doing the same thing. I don't know how many had any luck in the end." I'm not surprised. It was busy with dog walkers and picnickers and there was plenty of woodland in which the birds could lose themselves for as long as they wanted. I gave it an hour and moved on.

Walking over to Budworth Mere 

I wandered over to Budworth Mere. It had become a grey and cool lunchtime and it felt greyer and cooler once I got there. The feeders at the hide were busy with titmice, chaffinches and squirrels and a jay kept popping in to top up on peanuts.

Kingfisher, Budworth Mere 

A kingfisher sat in the drowned tree just in front of the hide, spending most of its time lurking in the branches then popping out to do a bit of fishing. It caught at least one minnow in the time I was there.

It's spotted something…

…and caught it, and has to hid behind the branches to spite the photographer.

Small parties of tufted ducks and great crested grebes drifted over the mere. Over on the far side a flock of black-headed gulls jostled for their turn to sit on top of the mooring piles the cormorants hadn't already taken. A pair of mute swans grazed at the water side with a few dozen coots and a dozen or so rather vocal curlews.

Budworth Mere 

As I walked down the path alongside the mere I bumped into small groups of tufted ducks and mallards mooching in the bankside willow roots.

Jay, Marbury Country Park 

At one point I had to wait a couple of minutes while a jay remembered where it had cached a couple of acorns on the path side.

Jay, Marbury Country Park 

Big Wood

I drifted into Big Wood (no, really) which was busy with chaffinches and mixed tit flocks. And randy woodpigeons. A flock of about forty lapwings silently flew low over the trees heading for the Northwich flashes. A couple of redwings I accidentally flushed from a bramble patch as I passed by turned out to be part of a flock of fifty or so of them. There probably wasn't far short that number of blackbirds but they were scattered around with never more than a handful of them at a time. There was a notable absence of buzzards, I usually hear them even if I can't see them round here.

Big Wood 

The light was already starting to fade as I crossed the Trent and Mersey Canal into the Northwich woodlands. A trio of bullfinches — two males and a female — were feeding in the treetops by the bridge. The woods on this side were very much quieter of birds, there were long stretches where I wasn't seeing anything.

Marbury Lane 

Haydn's Hide 

I walked along the canal then joined Marbury Lane and passed Haydn's Pool. I noticed the sign for the hide so I took the short detour and went up the steep and slippery steps with their rickety hand rails and had a look. I won't be bothering again.

The view from Haydn's Hide 

By Neumann's Flash 

A little further on I took the path to Neumann's Flash. The paths were busy with dogs and their walkers but they were no trouble.

Mallard, Neumann's Flash 

Neumann's Flash 

Mallards, moorhens and Canada geese pottered about by the causeway to the hide on the South side of the flash. Out in midwater was a raft of sixty-something shovelers and a pair of mute swans, behind them a few dozen wigeon and a couple of pairs of gadwall. Beyond them unidentifiable duck-shaped objects lurked in the willows and reed margins. I kept hearing teal but could only find a couple with a group of mallards hunkered in the reeds on one of the little islands on this side of the flash.

Canada goose, Neumann's Flash 
When the photographer doesn't notice twilight creeping up on him.

I wandered down the bund in the gathering gloom then round Ashton's Flash to the exit onto Old Warrington Road. Robins and wrens were having one last song before bedtime and blackbirds chunnered in the hedgerows. 

I decided not to rush and try and get the train to Manchester, getting the Cat 9 back to Warrington instead which in theory gives me a good ten minutes to walk across the road for the direct train home. Warrington's traffic being as it is I jumped ship at the river and walked up to the station and had five minutes' grace for buying my ticket. My bus was still stuck in the long queue trying to get into the bus station as my train arrived.

By Neumann's Flash 

There was a mid-afternoon report of three hawfinches in the trees by the car park. I don't care, I'd had a good day out.

Marbury Country Park and Budworth Mere

Sketch map: Marbury Country Park and surrounds

Marbury Country Park is a mix of open pasture and woodland just North of Northwich. Immediately to the North is Budworth Mere, to the South are the Northwich Woodlands and to the Southeasr is Neumann's Flash. The 8A bus between Northwich and Warrington via Comberbach stops outside the Western entrance to the country park, you will need to check the times as they're not very frequent. Alternatively you can walk in from Northwich:

• Walk down Warrington Old Road but instead of turning off onto the paths around the flashes keep on going and you'll get onto Marbury Lane.
• Walking along the North bank of Neumann's Flash you can either take the path through Dairy House Meadows and cross the metal footbridge over the Trent and Mersey Canal or you can carry on round and join the path leading to Marbury Lane.

The walk in from Northwich makes for a nice afternoon stroll and is pretty easy going, especially if you stick to the main paths.

Nuthatch

The birdlife is mostly what you would expect from a piece of Cheshire countryside: woodpigeons, corvids and buzzards out in the open and the standard suite of woodland birds. Look out for lesser spotted woodpeckers in the woods, you may have more luck than me. And of course any piece of woodland is worth checking out in Autumn and Winter for waifs and strays.

Marbury Country Park 

Big Wood 

Budworth Mere is a good-sized lake with a mixture of woodlands along the South bank, reedbeds on the West and a mixture of woods, farmland and sailing club facilities on the North, It's worth checking out for passage migrants: common scoters, little gulls and black terns sometimes stop by. It's also worth looking out for bitterns in Winter.

Budworth Mere 

There are enough paths and walks for a good wander round in pleasant surroundings and a couple of hours' decent birdwatching,

Northwich

Heron, Budworth Mere

It had been one of those nights where I got to sleep some time after the robin started singing at ten to seven so I didn't feel much like setting out early for a day's birdwatching. An afternoon wander somewhere in Cheshire was tempting. Chelford offered the possibility of a grey phalarope on Lapwing Hall Pool and a cattle egrets on Acre Nook Quarry. For some reason I've not been over to the Northwich flashes this year so I decided to have a stroll over that way. Which turned out to be a good call as the Crewe train was cancelled.

Northwich Station's being rebuilt after the roof fell in. They're making a nice job of it but it means that getting in and out of the station is a bit of a palaver. Other than that it was straight sledding all afternoon.

I walked down Warrington Old Road into Northwich Woods and thence to Ashton's Flash. A tree pipit flying overhead was a nice surprise, I'd written off any hopes of adding them to the year list. There was just the one teal with the mallards and black-headed gulls on Witton Brook as I walked over the bridge.

Ashton's Flash was fairly quiet, a few mallards dozing on the pools and goldfinches flitting about in twos and threes. I bumped into the first of what would be many jays screeching their ways through acorn collecting.

Black-headed gulls, lesser black-backs and herring gull, Neumann's Flash

Neumann's Flash was busy mostly with shovelers and coots. A small group of mallards dabbled with the family of mute swans by the isthmus leading to one of the hides off the bund. A mixed flock of gulls, mostly black-headed gulls with a dozen lesser black-backs and a few herring gulls and common gulls, was loafing on the bank by the side.

Herring gulls, black-headed gulls and common gulls, Neumann's Flash

Moorhens rummaged around in the reed margins while a Cetti's warbler sang from the depths and migrant hawkers patrolled the tops. Further out on the open water there were small rafts of tufted ducks, a couple of cormorants and half a dozen wigeon which were easier to see from the higher ground of the bund. A couple of dabchicks made a point of diving every time the camera shutter went.

Juvenile moorhen, Neumann's Flash

I bumped into the first of the very many mixed tit flocks of the afternoon at the end of the bund, a large family group of long-tailed tits with a dozen or more great tits and blue tits.

Field maple

It was a mild, cloudy day with just enough breeze to shiver the leaves on the trees. I spent a lot of the walk round to Daisy House Meadow checking to see if the movements in the trees ahead were woodpigeons, squirrels or titmice. Every so often they'd be goldfinches or chaffinches and very often they'd be the wind or falling leaves. A couple of times they were common darters zipping round the hawthorns. Tree sparrows fussed about the hedgerows by Warrington New Road, nuthatches called from the trees and a water rail called from the corner of the flash.

Walking round into Daisy House Meadows 

Daisy House Meadows 

I walked round onto Daisy House Meadows. The trees were busy with woodpigeons, magpies and jays, the hedgerows busy with titmice, robins and wrens. One of the tit flocks had a pair of bullfinches tagging along.

Heron, Daisy House Meadows

A mute swan and a heron were on the big pond by the path, the mallards preferred the pools largely hidden by trees further along. A very insistent juvenile buzzard called from the trees this side of the Trent and Mersey Canal but got no obvious response.

Big Wood

I crossed the canal into Marbury Country Park. Big Wood was noisy with robins and wrens, the occasional nuthatch and the calls of passing rooks and jackdaws. A stock dove sang as I approached Budworth Mere. I had a quick look in at the hide, a few blue tits and great tits bounced about in the bushes while more great tits and a couple of blackbirds fossicked about in the leaf litter.

First-Winter great crested grebe, Budworth Mere
It was only when I glanced at this photo that I realised how similar they are to a red-necked grebe they are at this stage. The shape of the bird and its bill are quite different but I can see how people new to the game and relying on a handbook might get confused.

It had evidently been a productive year for great crested grebes, a couple of dozen of them were on Budworth Mere, including a raft of a dozen first-Winter birds. A herd of coot was feeding on the far bank and more were on the water with a few groups of tufted ducks. Mallards lurked in the willows on the near bank while greylags and Canada geese made a lot of noise from somewhere near the sailing club.

Willows, Budworth Mere 

I walked along the path towards the little jetty. The blue-green algae bloom which was a distant change of shade at the wide point of the mere became a green mat coating the surface and the water bed beneath it. A heron loafed on the jetty with a couple of black-headed gulls. Just beyond a Cetti's warbler and a water rail could be heard in the reeds. It was late in the afternoon and curlews started calling from the fields across the mere.

Budworth Mere 

I had a sit down at the hide to check bus and train times and was entertained by another mixed tit flock, this one including a coal tit.

I had a five minute walk to the bus stop at Comberbach and the next bus was in half an hour. Kennel Wood"s a couple of minutes' walk from the bus stop so I had a quick nosy, passing a flock of pied wagtails in the cow field next to the path.

Kennel Wood 

Robins, wrens, a nuthatch and a couple of pheasants were the easiest finds in the wood, a great spotted woodpecker was hard work. I heard a willow tit-like churring in the undergrowth which was immediately drowned out by two duelling wrens. I didn't hear enough to be sure of the identification and there were enough great tits about to add to my doubts, they have a very similar scold call in their repertoire.

Kennel Wood 

I got back to the bus stop with six minutes to spare for catching the 9A to Warrington, which a couple of minutes later turned into seventeen. The nagging worry that it would count down to six then jump back to seventeen proved unfounded. We were treated to one of those sunsets where you want to stop the driver every three minutes to take a photo.

Sunset, Antrobus