The Fylde

Little egret, River Wyre

It looked like being the week's token fine day so I got me an old man's explorer ticket and went for a wander. I've neglected the Fylde this year, I had planned a visit to Skippool Creek but that got iced in favour of hospital visiting, so I thought I'd have a nosy round there, then get a bus somewhere and get back home somehow.

I got off the train at Poulton-le-Fylde and walked up the road to Skippool. I'd just crossed the new dual carriageway when, on a whim, I thought I'd look over the fence to see if there were any wagtails on the creek here. There were no wagtails, just a kingfisher sitting pretty as you please on a branch over the mud. The kingfisher's reactions were quicker than mine and it shot off down the creek like an electric blue bullet.

Wyre Road 

I walked down Wyre Road, the verges busy with large whites and red admirals and the trees busy with great tits and robins. Mallards dabbled and dozed in the creek and a little egret picked its way below the moored boats.

Skippool Creek 

It was low tide and when I looked between the banks of the creek where it ran into the river I could see hundreds of gulls and waders loafing on the mud. A crowd of herring gulls with a few lesser black-backs littered a high bank on the far side of the river, a couple of common gulls hiding in plain sight and a great black-back standing to one side. Black-headed gulls fussed about. Sleeping lapwings were distant dumpy silhouettes, the golden plovers amongst them catching the light as I changed position. A couple of curlews waded through the rills and puddles though it was a whimbrel I spotted first. The only green sandpiper of the day flew across the mouth of the creek and disappeared under a bank.

Curlew

By Wyre Road 

I walked along the road, keeping an eye on the river as I went. This involved a lot of peeping across the marsh between boats and jetties at distant objects. Crowds of redshanks fussed and fed by mud banks, a bar-tailed godwit strode across the mud, a distant line of brown lumps became sleeping curlews. The house sparrows, great tits and robins in the hedgerow by the road were vocal and noisy and kept well under cover. Southern hawkers patrolled the marsh. Occasionally a gigantic dragonfly would fly by and turn out to be two mating hawkers flying and hunting as they copulated.

Redshanks

River Wyre

River Wyre

At the sailing club I got a clearer view of the river, though most of the birds were still distant. There were hundreds of redshanks and dozens of curlews. Every bend in the mud banks had a little egret or two, a crowd of redshanks and a few oystercatchers, every rise on the other side of the river its loafing gulls and cormorants. Rooks and carrion crows fossicked about, a shelduck dabbled in a pool.

Spot the wren

I joined the Stanah Tramper Trail and followed the river downstream. The sea asters were looking blousy and the thistle exhausted but the bees and butterflies were finding enough to get by with. Charms of goldfinches twittered in the hedgerows and swallows twittered in the rigging of the boats moored on the marsh.

Swallows

Sea lavender 

Ordinarily, when I get to the fork in the trail I carry on down into Stanah and get a bus from there. Today, on a whim, I took the path to the right and walked round into the Wyre Estuary Country Park.

River Wyre

Stanah Tramper Trail 

The marshy gap between the path and the river got wider and soon it was out of view. Rooks and jackdaws clamoured in the fields between the path and Stanah. Goldfinches, linnets and swallows twittered over the marsh, chiffchaffs and dunnocks squeaked in the hedgerow and robins sang from small pathside trees. Speckled woods and red admirals fluttered about the hedgerow, a painted lady joined the large whites on the sea asters. More Southern hawkers patrolled the marsh, daring me to try and get their photos. A raven called from the heights of an electricity pylon and was answered across the river.

Painted lady 

Damsons

I followed the path through a glade of damson trees and got to the car park. A voice in the back of my head said I could carry on along the riverside path to Fleetwood. My knees suggested the voice in the back of my head has a screw loose. I decided to head into Stanah for the bus. The 24 to Blackpool was scheduled to arrive ten minutes before the 24 to Fleetwood so I waited for that and they arrived together, both running late. I headed to Blackpool for a bit of seawatching by the North Pier.

Herring gull 

It had clouded over by the time we arrived in Blackpool and it was feeling decidedly cooler. I got me a seat on the steps by the North Shore and started looking round. The tide was coming in and the pigeons and herring gulls were tidying the beach of picnic detritus while they could. A pied wagtail flitted about the promenade. 

Lake District from Blackpool North Shore

Most of the gulls close to shore were herring gulls. Nearly all the lesser black-backs were juveniles and there were a lot more of them out to sea and all looking very dark against the water. Every so often, way out, a dark object would turn out to be a passing cormorant. I'd concluded that all the dark gull-shaped objects flying by in the distance were juvenile lesser black-backs when one about half a mile out caught my eye because it was a lot barrel-chested and the wings weren't quite right. I'd concluded that it was just another lesser black-back the victim of wishful thinking when the bird crossed a sheen of sunlight which caught pale patches on the bases of the flight feathers of an otherwise all-dark bird. A skua, barrel-chested and short-tailed, a great skua. "Bonxie!" I said to myself. 

Herring gulls and lesser black-back 

I looked in vain for shearwaters, though I suspect they were out there to be found by telescope. A couple of possible Arctic skuas would probably have been gulls through a telescope I told myself. Juvenile Sandwich terns chased after their parents. There was a crossing of ducks as three distant eiders flew left and an equally distant common scoter flew right.

Blackpool North Pier

I gave it an hour and decided to call it a day. I walked round to Blackpool North and got the next train home. I hadn't milked the full value out of the old man's explorer ticket but I'd had a full day's birdwatching and it had been very productive and I was ready for my tea.

Skipool Creek

Sketch map: Skipool

Skipool Creek is a stretch of the Wyre near Poulton-Le-Fylde. It's a pleasant hour or so's stroll that can be fitted in with a bit of seawatching at Blackpool, Fleetwood or Knott End.

• It's a twenty minute walk from Poulton-Le-Fylde Station. There are frequent trains between Preston and Blackpool North and Blackpool South. Turn right as you leave the station and walk on to the bypass and carry on a few yards up Skipool Road then turn right onto Wyre Road.
• The 2C bus between Blackpool and Knott End stops at the Wyre Hotel close to the junction with Skipool Road.
• The 74 and 75 buses between Fleetwood and Preston goes through Little Thornton and down Skipool Road. For a first visit it's probably easiest to get off at Thornton Lodge and walk up Wyre Road.

Skipool Creek 

Skipool Creek is a brackish stream running into the Wyre. The path runs parallel to the river, the bank on this side being an extended boatyard. 

River Wyre

The birdlife on the river is what you would expect on a small estuary in the Northwest of England: mallards, lapwings, redshanks and little egrets most of the year, oystercatchers and curlews, greenshanks and green sandpipers, wigeon and gulls.

The hedgerow by the path has a feeding station hidden deep near the car park. The hedgerow and car park can get quite busy with small birds.

The path can get a bit damp, the more so past the entrance to the sailing club. On a fine day it's a nice walk down and onto the Stanah Tramper Trail. This takes you into Stanah, if you carry on to the end and walk down Stanah Road you can get the 24 bus between Fleetwood and Poulton-le-Fylde. If it's a damp day you might want to either retrace your steps down Wyre Road or take the path through the car park to Skipool Road for the 74 or 75 bus.

Lancashire bumper bundle

Twite, Knott End

I've been feeling that I've been skimping lately so I took advantage of a decent night's sleep after nodding off before two and set off on a jaunt with an old man's explorer ticket on a very bright November day.

Skipool Creek 

I got the train to Poulton-le-Fylde and walked up to Skipool Creek. The interminable bypass building continues to make a mess but at least the pedestrian crossing lights are working now. The tide was low so both the creek and the Wyre were mostly exposed mud. Mallards sat on the banks of the creek watching a couple of workmen repairing a jetty. A mixed tit flock which seemed to be equal numbers of blue tits and long-tailed tits with a couple of great tits bounced about the trees in the car park. A rat and a robin were feasting at the feeding station hidden in the hedgerow. A curlew was feeding below the bank at the mouth of the creek.

Lapwings, teal, black-headed gulls, herring gulls, carrion crow and little egret, Skipool Creek

Out on the river a flock of a hundred or so lapwings loafed on the mud with a few dozen herring gulls and black-headed gulls, some more curlews and a few redshanks. It sounded like there were more redshanks upstream. Rounding the path to the sailing club I got the other side of a grassy mound and found a flock of more than a hundred golden plovers on a mudbank close to the bank together with a few more lapwings. From here I could also see further upstream in the South bank of the river where a flock of a few dozen jackdaws and a few carrion crows were being very skittish, settling to feed on the mud for a few minutes then taking to the air in a panic. I couldn't see the cause, normally if I can't see what's spooking birds this time of year I look for a merlin but the waders staying put suggests it must have been something else, perhaps a fox on the bank.

Golden plovers and lapwings, Skipool Creek

Twite, Knott End

Twite, Knott End

I walked back to the roadworks and caught the 2C to Knott End. Literally the first birds I saw as I got off the bus at the ferry terminal were a flock of twenty-eight twite sitting twittering on the slipway. I like twite, they don't look like much in the handbooks but they're tough little buggers full of character. A few turnstones were barging around, literally having to shoulder charge their way past some of the twite that weren't for moving for anything smaller than a spaniel. 

Twite, Knott End

Twite, Knott End

Shelduck, Knott End

Looking across Morecambe Bay towards Barrow

A small brown dog passed by so I took the opportunity to sidle past and walk down the slipway. It was a beautiful day, the light was fantastic and a cold North wind was blowing in from Morecambe Bay. Walking by Skipool Creek I'd been wondering if I'd dressed too warm for the day. I hadn't. A dozen shelduck were dabbling in the mud while a handful of oystercatchers flew about by the river. Walking back I found the twites and turnstones had taken to fossicking about in the wrecked seaweed at the top of the slipway in the company of a couple of pied wagtails.

Twite, Knott End

Twite, Knott End

Twite, Knott End

Turnstone, Knott End

Fleetwood from Knott End 

I reckoned I deserved a cup of tea so I got one. Suitably replenished I had a stroll down The Esplanade in the sunshine as I waited for the 89 to Lancaster. This journey turned out to be a good idea, it takes an hour and meanders its way through the mosslands between the Wyre and the Conder, which is very agreeable on a day like this. As we made our way between Preesall and Pilling skeins of pink-footed geese flew low overhead to graze the fields inland. I stared at every one of them in the hopes one might contain the snow goose that's been doing the rounds of the Lancashire mosses but it wasn't happening today. Some fields had large flocks of rooks or jackdaws, some small flocks of curlews, quite a lot had nothing at all, just to keep me honest. The bus takes a detour through Conder Green and Glasson Dock. I was tempted by glimpses of teal on the river to get off for a nosy round but the next bus was more than two hours later which didn't fit my plans. 

At Lancaster I walked down to the station and got a very busy train to Silverdale for a late afternoon wander round Leighton Moss, catching the twilight train back to Lancaster. The feeders by The Hideout were very busy with small birds topping up for the night. It's not often you see coal tits outnumbering blue tits and great tits. I'd have missed the marsh tit if it hadn't sneezed out a whistle to announce its arrival.

From Lilian's Hide, mostly coots

A couple of Cetti's warblers were having a singing duel by the skytower. Given the relative lack of quality and brio I suspect they were young birds establishing Winter territories. The pool at Lilian's Hide was covered with coots, gadwall and tufted ducks with shovelers, teal and mallards loafing on the banks by the hide with a couple of snipe and a trio of dabchicks.

Gadwall, Leighton Moss

Snipe, Leighton Moss

I wandered towards the causeway and had a sit down on the bench by the road overlooking the reserve. As the sun came down a few hundred starlings flew in to roost. A small cloud today, as Winter progresses the crowds will grow and the spectacular murmurations will begin. There were more signs of Winter. I'd passed a few redwings eating the last of the hawthorn berries by the path. Fieldfares started drifting in to roost in the trees by the causeway. They started in ones and twos, then dozens. In the end there were more than a hundred settled in there.

Silverdale Station 

I walked back to the station in the twilight and got the train back to Lancaster. This is the bit that always annoys me: the Northern train from Barrow is scheduled to arrive in Lancaster a minute after the Northern train to Manchester leaves and you have to wait an hour for the next so I have to buy a single to Preston on a West Coast train. Today it was immaterial as that Manchester train was cancelled. Which led to a huge crowd on Platform 2 at Preston for the next train to Manchester. I looked at the alternative routes and saw a long list of cancellations. So I squeezed on and just managed to make a connection with my train home from Oxford Road. Which turned out to be a pretty good end to an excellent day's birdwatching.

Sunset over the Leighton Moss coastal hides from the train 

Plan Z

Skipool Creek

The plan had been to have a day out at Hodbarrow to see if/how the little terns are faring. The Barrow train wasn't amongst the cancellations at Oxford Road though it was a lot busier than usual, probably because of some of the earlier cancellations. We got as far as Wigan without any problems then spent half an hour waiting for a driver. In the end the driver who had finished at Wigan took the train up to Preston where the train was cancelled. Looking at the options, assuming nothing untoward happened at Lancaster or Barrow the earliest I would be arriving at Millom would be quarter to three. Given how tricky it is getting back to Manchester from West Cumbria when the trains are behaving themselves I didn't fancy my chances of getting home much before midnight. In fact, heading anywhere North of Preston on the Northern trains looked a bit too much of a gamble. So I was stuck with an old man's explorer ticket to get some value from.

In the end I got the next Blackpool train, got off at Poulton le Fylde and had a walk up to Skipool Creek. The river was high so there wasn't a lot about save a few mallards and gulls and a solitary little egret on the far bank. I walked up the Stanah Tramper Trail along the river up to Stanah. A couple of buzzards soaring high over the other side of the river towards Hambleton were harassed by carrion crows. A couple of chiffchaffs sang in the trees, a reed bunting sang in the field by the path. There seemed to be a blackbird feeding on the path every hundred yards.

Skipool Creek

There was more bird life in the fields at Stanah, mostly woodpigeons and house sparrows with collared doves, greenfinches and goldfinches. A pair of corn buntings in a hawthorn bush in a field of sheep was a nice surprise.

It was a bit of a bust birdwatching wise but the weather held and it's a nice walk. Again I was concerned about the dearth of butterflies about.

I walked into Thornton, got the bus back to Poulton and went home via Bolton and Crewe just to get some sort of value out of my train ticket. Which reminded me I haven't visited Sandbach Flashes yet this year.

Wyre

Redshank, Skipool Creek

It was a dreich sort of day and promised to get no better so it was a choice of going on a wild goose chase or wader watching. So I got myself an old man's explorer ticket and only made my mind up as the train approached Preston.

Skipool Creek

I stayed on the train up to Poulton-le-Fylde and set off walking for Skipool Creek. With the bypass roadworks on Amounderness Way getting to the very messy stage it's almost more difficult to cross the road than it is to pronounce it. There was a little egret feeding on the field by Thornton Lodge as I passed.

I turned onto Wyre Road and bumped into a mixed tit flock, mostly blue tits with a couple of pairs of great tits and a couple of goldfinches along for the ride. A couple of yards further along a redshank feeding in the mud by the first berthed boat saw me before I saw it and created a tremendous fuss. Absolutely nothing responded to its alarm calls, unless the dirty looks cast its way by half a dozen mallards in the creek counts.

Grey weather had turned to mizzle, which didn't help my efforts to identify the waders upriver by the road bridge. The waders on this side were redshanks and lapwings accompanied by black-headed gulls and a common gull.

House sparrow, Skipool Creek
(It makes a change, photographing someone else's spadgers)

The hedgerow between the car park and the sailing club was heaving with birds. Blackbirds, mistle thrushes and song thrushes feasted on sloes and haws, greenfinches were busy dismantling dog rose hips. I didn't notice the feeders hidden in the depths of the hedge until they were brought to my attention by blue tits and great tits. There were also a lot of sparrows rummaging about in the hawthorns and ivy, the house sparrows would occasionally come out and show themselves, the tree sparrows didn't get any further than sticking their heads out, seeing I was there and quickly retreating undercover. The coal tits and goldfinches stayed high in the trees.

Skipool Creek

The weather closed in and got nasty as I stood by the sailing club scanning the far bank of the river. The tide was high so there were over a hundred lapwings on the mud with a couple of dozen each of curlew and redshank and forty-odd herring gulls.

I'd stopped having fun so I got the 74 bus into Fleetwood, partly because it was there and it was dry, partly in the hopes that the weather might calm down by the time I got to Fleetwood. (Narrator: it didn't.)

Knott End from Fleetwood Dock

In Fleetwood I got a bag of chips from a chippy on Dock Road and walked down to the lifeboat station for a bit of seawatching. The high tide had brought a couple of hundred oystercatchers onto the mudbars by Knott End. A couple of dozen redshanks were identifiable in the gloom (made a lot easier when they flapped about) and half a dozen curlews were easy enough. A flock of about thirty dunlins were unidentifiable until they took flight and whirled round the oystercatchers. There were a lot of waders that were just unidentifiable shadows. The gulls were nearly all herring gulls.

The ticket I bought on the bus was good for all of Blackpool's buses and trams so after having the wind blowing the rain in my face for a while I decided it would be as well to jack it in for the day and get a tram into Blackpool. I rode the full length to Starr Gate and just caught the Preston train at Squires Gate (I'd significantly underestimated how long it takes to cross the road at the bottom of the Promenade).

Skipool Creek

A bloody horrible day with some decent birdwatching and moody, atmospheric scenery. There are worse things.