Alkrington Woods

Twilight descends on the River Irk

It was a thoroughly grim and stormy start to the day. Both I and the birds in the back garden kept under cover. Across the road the school playing field was carpeted in jackdaws and gulls. I had no intention of going for a walk.

The need to get a new monthly travel card asserted itself so I went into town and got one. Oxford Road on Tuesday wasn't a lot better than Oxford Road on Monday and the station staff had my sympathy. Nonetheless I wanted to get some value out of the new card so I decided to go over Victoria, get the train to Rochdale and see if I could get the Town Hall peregrines onto my year list.

Manchester Victoria was considerably worse than Oxford Road. The key problem here was that the Transpennine line between Greenfield and Huddersfield was closed due to damage caused by a fire this weekend. Consequently all the trains not replaced by buses were going through Rochdale and Halifax, which is a fairly busy route anyway, and everything had snarled up. This is what happens when successive governments of all stripes spend forty years announcing plans for new Transpennine rail routes and doing nothing about them while closing ones that already exist.

I gave it up and went for the bus. The 100 to the Trafford Centre was due in ten minutes, I'd get that and go home. The 59 turned up before it, I remembered that goes by Alkrington Woods and the sun was threatening to show its face. So I had an hour's wander round the woods as the sun went down.

Canada geese, mute swans, black-headed gulls, tufted ducks and a herring gull

The lodge by Manchester Old Road was busy with mute swans, Canada geese and tufted ducks. Black-headed gulls had a pre-roost wash while pairs of coots squabbled and fought for the territorial rights of stretches of water they then swam away and ignored.

Perch Pool 

The next lodge along the causeway, Perch Pool, was busy with mallards and coots. I almost missed the pair of gadwalls in the shadows of the willows, half a dozen wigeons were dozing midwater.

River Irk

I walked along the River Irk into Middleton. Robins, great tits and blue tits sang in the trees. Wrens scolded my passing by. Woodpigeons, magpies and parakeets clattered about in the trees. 

Alkrington Woods 

As I approached the entry onto Manchester Old Road a bullfinch sang wistfully deep in one of the willow trees. It rather matched the blues and pinks and greys of the twilight.

Alkrington Woods

Alkrington Woods 

I seem to be in a filling in the gaps mood this week. In part it's a reaction to Monday's long trip out but it's mostly because I'm sleeping oddly and getting that sleep when I can, which means I'd be cutting it very fine for the trains out. Today I headed out for a walk through Alkrington Woods, just because. 

It was a cloudier, cooler sort of day, good for walking. I got the train into town and the 18 bus from Oxford Road. This goes through Alkrington to Langley, I'd be getting off just after the M60 for the entrance to the woods on Manchester Road. I'd forgotten how long it takes the bus to get up Rochdale Road, which isn't a function of distance or traffic conditions, it just does. A quarter of a century's experience never worked out just why. It was a relief when we got to Blackley and time started running normally.

I got off the bus a bit puzzled as I'd seen a sign for a public footpath I hadn't noticed before. It was pointing in the right direction and a quick check of the map suggested it should lead into the woods so I gave it a go and walked down the road as indicated. Fifty yards down there was a big metal gate, a lot of "Private property. Keep out" signs and a gated community behind it. There was even a "Do not trespass on this bridge" sign on the bridge over Boardman Brook. 

A dead end

There were gaps in the fence either side of the road with rough paths leading into the woodland by the brook. The most likely one headed North so I tried that first and came to a dead end twenty yards in. The one heading South dropped down ended at the brook. I'd upset some blackbirds, robins, blackcaps and wrens for no good reason. I retraced my steps and walked up Manchester Road to the proper entrance to the woods and it's tree-covered sign.

Crossing the little bridge over the brook to join the path down through the woods it became apparent the path did used to run down to that gap in the fence. It looked like some land had slipped and taken the footpath with it.

I walked along the path by the brook. Most of the songscape was blackbirds and robins, chiffchaffs and blackcaps were thin on the ground. Wrens sang when I passed by. Great tits and blue tits were only seen when they broke cover to barrack magpies.

Boardman Brook 

It was more of the same the length of the brook to where it met the River Irk. I knew the confluence was coming because the brook caught up speed and ring-necked parakeets screeched in the treetops.

The first of the lodges

Coots were nesting on the first of the lodges I came to, otherwise there were just a handful of mallards and a black-headed gull. The pond by the road was busy with Canada geese, mallards and pigeons and a mute swan dozed in one corner.

I still had some legs on me so rather than waiting for the next bus to Manchester (three had sailed by nose to tail as I got to the pond) I decided to walk up to Langley via Bowlee. Again, just because.

By Boardman Lane 

I cut a corner by walking up Boardman Lane to Heywood Old Road and I was glad that I did, despite the traffic doing the same thing. I was soon walking past buttercup-littered meadows busy with woodpigeons, greenfinches and starlings and with hedgerows bustling with spadgers. Somewhere in one of the hawthorn bushes way out in the fields a yellowhammer was singing, which was a nice surprise.

Windermere Walking Path 

On Heywood Old Road there's a shortcut into Langley along the Windermere Walking Path. So I took it. It was an unexpectedly pleasant walk, a grazed hilly pasture on my right and hedgerows rich in hawthorns and dog roses. The hedgerows were heaving with greenfinches, house sparrows, wrens and robins and whitethroats sang from the fields. 

A bald robin

A strange bird bustling about in a tree caught my eye. To my surprise it turned out to be a bald robin, a few orange feathers left on its chest to show it was an adult. It was in two minds whether or not to be shy of me and in the end it decided I wasn't anything so I got a good look at it. A bald bird would usually suggest a mite infestation but although it also didn't have much of a tail the wing feathers looked in good condition. I wondered if it might be an early starter in the post-breeding moult.

Robin

Not all the long-tailed tits were hiding in deep cover. A willow warbler singing in a shallow by the pathside was added to the day's tally.

I walked through the gate at the end and onto Windermere Road with a short walk for the bus stop for the 18 back to Manchester. I've done a lot of work in Langley over the years and often wondered where these paths went.

Alkrington Woods

Goldcrest

Being of a naturally awkward disposition my reaction on being offered a very pleasant sunny Autumn day was that I should stay at home reading Chips Own Paper and drinking too much tea. After some internal disputation I decided to have one of those filling in the gaps visits I'd planned for a rainy day. I went into town and got the 59 bus to Middleton, getting off in Rhodes for a visit to Alkrington Woods.

I got off at Croft Gates Road so I could start my walk at the lodges. Crossing Manchester Old Road was the hardest part of the whole adventure. Walking a little down Silburn Way I went through the gates and followed the path running between the lodges and the river, a couple of house martins flying overhead being a reminder of Summer.

Mallards and mute swan, Rhodes Lodges

The pool nearest the entrance, which you can see easily from the bus, was busy with mallards, a few Canada geese and a pair of mute swans. A couple of coots and a moorhen pottered about, a heron stood sentinel on a drowned branch and tufted ducks lurked under waterside willows. A small child arrived and rustled a paper bag and as if by magic a couple of dozen black-headed gulls appeared.

Coot

I was here for the woodland birds and so far was only finding singing robins. It made a nice change having the target species being the bread and butter birds it's too easy to take for granted. 

River Irk

The path drifted over to the trees by the riverbank and I bumped into a couple of magpies. The paths were fine and there were only occasional patches of mud; I had wondered about the wisdom of this visit as the Irk floods at the drop of a hat. As it was, the river flowed loud and fast but within its bounds though you could see plenty of evidence of its having been a bit boisterous lately.

Alkrington Woods 

I was hearing but not seeing long-tailed tits in the trees. Looking round for them I found a couple of goldcrests having a scrap. 

Goldcrests

Goldcrests 

Goldcrest
The goldcrest equivalent of the Tarzan cry after he's beaten a gorilla. It sounds like a faint buzzing.

While I was trying to get pictures of them the mixed tit flock arrived. The blue tits and great tits were conspicuous enough, especially when they came over to churr at me, the chiffchaffs quietly flitted through the tree canopy and the long-tailed tits sidled through the undergrowth like thieves in the night. I came to the conclusion that the goldcrest tagging along with the blue tits was the one that had been chased off in the fight. Don't think for one moment I wasn't looking for yellow-browed warblers, not that I found any.

Alkrington Woods 

I dawdled along the river, bumping into another, smaller, tit flock along the way together with a jay, some chaffinches and a few woodpigeons then eventually drifted into Middleton town centre. There's another, longer, walk to be had South of the river and now I've got a taste for it I'll do that next time.

Sycamore