Dovestone Reservoir

Mallards and ducklings

I had no intention of going for a walk round Dovestone Reservoir.

Something happens every year and it comes as a surprise every year. I've been wondering what's been up with me this week, until this morning when I went out into the back garden to see if we have a winner in the First Rose of the Year stakes (we do, it's "A Touch of Blue" and it's still only April). My eyes started to feel scratchy and the penny dropped. The pollen count is moderate but the grass-cutting count is high and the hay fever season is upon us once again. Like the first rose, it gets earlier every year. With me the first onset manifests as a feeling that all my strings have been cut and it never dawns on me it's hay fever until the itchy symptoms hit. You'd think I'd know by now. Having established I hadn't got the dreaded lurgi or Murgatroyd's twinges I could just ignore it and get on with things. I didn't have the energy for Plan A or Plan B for today so I got a pot of tea down me, got the lunchtime train into town and headed East, because I am very conscious nearly all this month's birdwatching has been westbound.

Reports early in the morning of a singing wood warbler that came and went quickly at Birchwood reminded me that there's sometimes a chance of finding one singing at Binn Green, by Dovestone Reservoir, and if I was tremendously lucky there might also be a ring ousel passing through. The odds were very long but a dawdle up Holmfirth Road in the sunshine had an appeal. I checked the bus times, I could get off the train at Mossley, get the 350 to The Clarence at the bottom of Holmfirth Road and save myself the walk across Greenfield. And so I did. It took about ten minutes longer but I had more energy to put into having a bit of an explore.

By Holmfirth Road 

The walk up Holmfirth Road was very pleasant indeed. The gradient creeps up on you, I tend not to realise until I notice I'm looking into tree canopies by the roadside. Along the way robins, wrens and blackcaps kept a constant chorus with solos by chaffinches, nuthatches and a coal tit. Woodpigeons clattered about in the trees, blue tits and great tits fidgeted through the undergrowth and the sheep in the fields were accompanied by jackdaws and the occasional mistle thrush. 

Looking over to Chew Valley
The sliver of blue is Dovestone Reservoir 

Dovestone Edge 

Dovestone Reservoir 

Rising higher, chiffchaffs and goldfinches, then willow warblers joined the chorus. Pairs of stock doves joined the woodpigeons and jackdaws in the fields, and some of the jackdaws had youngsters in tow. The wind was brisk, the orange tips and brimstones flying low to the grass to avoid the fate of the leaves whizzing and tumbling down the road. Stopping to admire the view and take photographs included the very real risk of being brained by pine cones.

As Dovestones Reservoir came properly into view so did the handful of Canada geese cruising about at the car park end.

Nicely weathered millstone grit atop Alderman's Hill

Approaching Binn Green I kept scanning the hilltops, just in case any ring ousels or wheatears wanted to make an appearance. They didn't, but don't look, don't see. The woodland was almost invisibly busy: the songscape was rich in robins, chiffchaffs, willow warblers, wrens and chaffinches; every so often I'd see a blue tit or great tit fidget through the conifers and a small flock of goldfinches fussed about the treetops. I almost missed the handful of siskins, their contact calls almost drowned out by a sudden rush of traffic noise.

Bilberry

Binn Green 

I pottered about the rocks at Binn Green admiring the view, listening to the birds, accidentally upsetting meadow pipits, and trying to use trees and rocks as windbreaks and finding it a lost cause. Trying to take photos of the scenery and the bilberries in flower whilst being buffeted by the wind was a challenge to put it mildly. Some hardy souls were walking the tops of Dovestone Edge opposite, I wondered if they might be slightly potty.

Halfway down the steps

I dropped down into relative shelter and found myself walking down the steps to the bottom. I wondered if this was wise, especially when the knees wondered how I was getting back up again. I wasn't going back up the steps, that was for sure. I'd have to walk up the service road back to Holmfirth Road. While I was here I thought I'd walk down to the dam between Yeoman Hey and Dovestone reservoirs and have a nosy.

Yeoman Hey Reservoir 

The wind was very bracing and bursts of white horses skimmed across the reservoirs. A house martin shot headlong into the wind and flew up the valley, the first of a small and fitful passage of house martins and sand martins heading for the wilds of Yorkshire. A couple of drake mallards cruised along the bankside on Yeoman Hey while a very busy pied wagtail fussed about the bottom of the dam, flitting from side to side. At first I thought he was servicing a nestful of mouths on one or other side but in the end I had to conclude he had the fidgets. As did a common sandpiper which tired of rummaging about the bankside and flew over the dam to bob about on the banks of Dovestone Reservoir.

Dovestone Reservoir 

I was going to turn round and walk back so I walked over the dam to the other side to admire the scenery and took the path that runs alongside Dovestone Reservoir to the car park. Like you do.

Reed bunting

There was barely a cloud in the sky, the sun was bright, the light electric, the scenery splendid and the wind at my back. I half-expected Lilian Gish to pass by in a flurry of sticks and leaves. I stopped by one of the long drains feeding the reservoir, just in case a dipper or grey wagtail might be taking advantage of the facilities. Robins and reed buntings caught insects on the pavings and pairs of goldfinches flew in for a drink. A very skittish grey wagtail was working the outflow at the end.

Dovestone Edge and inlet drain

Black-headed gulls and jackdaws passed overhead. Great tits, robins and willow warblers sang from the small plantations along the bank. Greenfinches and bullfinches called softly before disappearing into the trees as I passed, blackbirds and wrens struck poses and sang their defiance. Every so often I'd bump into a pheasant, more often I heard cocks in the background calling rivals into battle.

Dovestone Reservoir 

Walking by the reservoir 

Chew Valley 

Any thoughts that it might be less windy as I descended towards the car park and the dam were knocked on the head as I reached the mouth of the Chew Valley. The path turns 90°, instead of having the wind on my back blowing down from Yeoman Hey I had a much stronger wind blowing in my face from up tops. Any frivolous ideas that I might take the path and go up a bit into the valley swiftly put themselves back in the box.

A pair of mallards and their ducklings rummaged about the jackdaws in a field by the path. More mallards lounged on the bank by the car park and swallows whizzed about the dam. They looked and behaved like fixtures rather than the passing martins.

Walking back to Holmfirth Road
The topmost line of trees is the road. 

I walked up the lane and rejoined the songscape on Holmfirth Road which was as loud and busy as it was on my way up. I stopped to take a photo and was startled by a sharp tap on the top of my head as an oak tree jettisoned a leafy stick. "Berk!" said the sheep from across the road. They were probably right.

Etherow Valley

River Etherow 

It was a bright, sunny morning promising to cloud over later. All my joints ached and I was being reminded, and not gently, that walking involves the movement of articulated bony stilts. I decided to listen to the morning session of the Test Match and then try and walk some cooperation back into the component parts which is how I came to be sitting on the train to Hadfield with a view to a nice gentle potter along the Longendale Trail.

Moss Lane

I got off at Broadbottom. I'd wondered about the road running down to the River Etherow and I decided this was the time to go and have a nosy at it. I climbed the steps up to the main road then turned into Moss Lane and started the steep descent. I didn't envy the locals driving or walking up the road in icy weather! The singing blackbirds and woodpigeons were joined by chiffchaffs as I walked down and the chattering of magpies outshouted by a couple of quarreling jays.

Broadbottom Great Wood

The road became a country lane. To my right, beyond the houses, I started to see the edge of Great Wood and ahead, beyond the trees of the valley, the hills of Derbyshire. At the bottom of the lane I could turn left and walk up Hodge Lane back to Broadbottom or turn right to Terra Incognita. So I turned right. At the crossroads a little way along I could have taken one of the paths into the wood but decided to go down Leyland Lane. 

Leyland Lane 

The lane runs beside Hurstclough Brook to the river. At the top of the lane a grey wagtail quietly shuffled into the cover of the waterside vegetation. Blackcaps, chiffchaffs and goldfinches sang in the hedgerows and a flock of rooks were doing something involving a lot of noise a couple of fields away. Blackbirds, dunnocks and woodpigeons joined the songscape. A couple of very noisy buzzards wheeled above the trees but were only fitfully visible from the path. Black-headed gulls flew overhead and for the life of me I can't think where they'd been or where they were going.

Great tits, chaffinches and chiffchaffs flitted about between the trees. I saw two small birds sitting in a tree on the other side of a field and spent five minutes trying, and failing, to identify them. I judged that they were youngsters by the way they were sitting still with their mouths open but nothing came to feed them while I was watching. I could eliminate many suspects but not identify them. They might have been chaffinches, or chiffchaffs, or even spotted flycatchers but the distance defeated me. Even when they're sitting still in plain sight birds can be an identification nightmare.

The large whites, meadow browns and ringlets fluttering about the verges were mercifully easier to spot and identify.

Ringlet

River Etherow and Broadbottom Beach

The path curved round as it approached the river and started to run parallel to it. I walked past a gate submerged in the hedgerow and came upon a ford over the river, evidently used frequently by farm vehicles judging by the tracks. I wandered down to see if there were any birds on the river (there weren't, and nor were there any on the beach downstream) and noticed a footbridge just upstream. That gate was evidently entrance to the path leading to the bridge, a metal footbridge must go somewhere… I walked back and crossed the bridge into Derbyshire.

Upstream from the bridge

The path on the other side rose steeply up a wooded bank. I'd promised myself an easy dawdle along the flat. More great tits, goldfinches and blackbirds passed between the trees and every so often there'd be a clattering of wings as some woodpigeons decided I'd got too close. A sign nailed to a tree told me I was walking the Cown Edgeway. Another sign told me a side path headed for a scout camp. I carried on up the Edgeway, conscious that I had a Sid James mask in my pocket.

Joining the Cown Edgeway 

Nearing the top of the climb

As the walk got steeper the birches, alders and occasional oak trees started to give way to elderly hawthorns. Thirty or forty years ago I'd have been scanning these with a reasonable expectation of finding a flycatcher or redstart. I looked anyway, just in case, you never know until you've tried. I didn't find any.

Cown Edgeway 

Longendale in the distance 

I reached the top and the path narrowly followed the edge of a field with a sharp drop into the woods on my right. I stopped and tried to work out where I was without looking at the map. To the left Broadbottom jutted out of the trees and stopped abruptly at the steep drop to the river that surprises the first-time traveler on the Glossop line. Dead ahead in the distance Longendale passed between the hills. To the right were the hills above Glossop and the Snake Pass. As the crow flies, on the map I'd travelled about half a mile.

Honeysuckle

Swallows zipped about the sheep's and lambs' ankles, goldfinches and greenfinches twittered in hawthorns and blackbirds sang in the trees. The path reached open country just before it reached the farmstead, behind me was the rolling green hill hiding Ludworth on the other side. I passed through the gate and walked down Far Woodseats Lane to Marple Road. Swallows and swifts passed low overhead. Blackbirds and goldfinches sang, greenfinches squeaked as I passed by, robins furtively disappeared into hedge bottoms. The brambles and honeysuckles of the hedgerow were busy with butterflies and bees. It was a rather nice walk.

Far Woodseats Lane 

Fortune favours the stupid so I had a five minute wait for the last bus to Stockport from the invisible bus stop by Sandy Lane.

A Pennine stroll

Common sandpiper, Walkerwood Reservoir

The weather forecast offered the unappealing prospect of a cool day with a high pollen count so I decided to head for the hills. The only question was: which hills? I've not been to Stalybridge Country Park and the reservoirs beyond yet this year so I went thataway, courtesy of the train to Stalybridge and the 343 bus to Millbrook.

Robin, Stalybridge Country Park

I walked up Brushes Road and joined the path into the country park where the blackcaps, chiffchaffs and chaffinches were leading the chorus. Blackbirds, woodpigeons, robins and a mistle thrush rummaged about in the undergrowth while song thrushes sang from the treetops. I knew I was approaching Walkerwood Reservoir when the willow warblers joined in the chorus and a grey wagtail flitted from a puddle on the path ahead into a nearby tree.

Walkerwood Reservoir 

I had wondered if I hadn't perhaps overdressed. As I stood on the road across the dam at Walkerwood Reservoir and felt the wind trying to reach my kidneys I was reassured that I hadn't. It was one of those days where the light was bright and the clouds heavy and dark and the scenery looked all the more picturesque for it. A few Canada geese and mallards bobbed about on the reservoir and black-headed gulls floated by in the wind. Blackbirds, song thrushes, chiffchaffs and willow warblers sang in the trees around the reservoir and it was all very pleasant. 

Walkerwood Reservoir 

I'd been looking on the bank by the dam for any wagtails or waders and had no joy until I got to the end and a common sandpiper bobbed up and took noisy exception to me. All that noise didn't stop it from carrying on with its foraging, nor did it seem a lot bothered that it was coming my way and close in. Common sandpipers tend to be frustratingly distant figures in the landscape so it was nice to see one this close to for a change.

Common sandpiper, Walkerwood Reservoir
Nice to see the detailed patterns of the upperparts for once, from a distance this looks plain brown.

I carried on up Brushes Road, the hedgerows busy with goldfinches, greenfinches and great tits, the trees noisy with chiffchaffs, willow warblers and chaffinches. A treecreeper made a cameo appearance on a stunted oak before disappearing in plain sight. A little further on a jay quietly floated by in the trees. 

Walkerwood Reservoir 

As I approached Brushes Farm a kestrel passed low overhead. A mistle thrush that had been with the sheep in the field spotted it and rattled its way into the hawthorns by the path, where it then spotted me and gave me the evil eye until I had walked past.

Brushes Road

A few dunnocks and blackcaps added to the songscape as I took the ascent by Brushes Reservoir. I kept an optimistic ear open for wood warblers or redstarts but it wasn't happening today. You can't see much of the reservoir for trees for most of this stretch, a lot of the trees being stunted oaks with lots of holes in them so I wasn't being entirely unrealistic. 

Looking back along Brushes Road

I'd decided I'd walk up to the open country by the Swineshaw Reservoirs and give both my joints and my wind a bit of a workout. The walking underfoot was easy as it's a metalled road used by reservoir maintenance vehicles but they don't use it very often. As I got higher I started to notice the absence of jackdaws calling in the distance. 

That there Manchester city centre 

I broke out into open country and reached level ground. As I took a breather I took in the views. Looking down the valley Manchester city centre was a hazy blue mound of children's building blocks with clusters of columns sticking up in the middle. Up tops was a rolling green landscape punctuated by millstone grit walls and patches of purple rhododendrons.

By Brushes Road

Linnets and woodpigeons flew across the moors. Meadow pipits, skylarks and reed buntings sang on the open moor, willow warblers and wrens from the bushes and trees in the hollows, and curlews called from the tops. As I walked through the copse by the turnoff to Lower Swineshaw Reservoir I noticed a pair of small finches flitting about the low bushes to the left and took a very long time to recognise them as redpolls. I get to hear redpolls singing perhaps once a year but that's no real excuse for it. A couple of greenfinches twittered in the bushes, a blackcap sang in the trees.

A rather windswept meadow pipit, Upper Swineshaw Reservoir

Upper Swineshaw Reservoir

I reached Upper Swineshaw Reservoir and had a scan round. Linnets fussed about in the waterside vegetation and a grey wagtail fossicked about on the stones in the far corner. Half a dozen drake mallards dozed on the far bank.

Lower Swineshaw Reservoir

Lower Swineshaw Reservoir

Looking down onto Lower Swineshaw Reservoir woodpigeons, magpies and a wren flew about the treetops. I'd walked across to where the road becomes a rough bridleway crossing Swineshaw Brook when the first pair of stonechats of the day took exception to me.

Female stonechat, Upper Swineshaw Reservoir

It was excellent walking weather. I'd got this far and the maps reckoned it was only a couple of miles or so to Tintwistle by the Pennine Bridle Way so I decided to carry on and explore a bit of new territory. I walked through the gate and the path forked. Which was the bridleway? I chose the one going uphill, which turned out to be right. I chose well: the other path did a sharp uphill climb with a browsing bullock blocking the way halfway up.

Meadow pipit at the top of its parachute song, they sing on the way up then slowly spiral down to ground singing all the way.

Juvenile stonechat
The rather fussy background's a field of cotton grass.

Here on in for the next mile or so it was rolling moorland with linnets, mipits, skylarks and curlews with pairs of stonechats scolding from the wings and the occasional passing black-headed gull. A raven cronked its way over the tops.

First sight of the Derbyshire hills

Meadow pipit

Male stonechat

The descent towards the Derbyshire border along Ogden Brook brought a change in the birdlife. Blackbirds, wrens and willow warblers sang from the trees in the hollows and distant plantations. A few swifts flew low over grazing sheep and three oystercatchers flew high overhead. As I got lower I started meeting jackdaws, carrion crows and woodpigeons on the rough pasture.

Heading for Ogden Brook
The valley is the crease in the landscape running left to right across the picture.

Chiffchaff, Ogden Brook

Ogden Brook where the bridleway passes it on a tiny bridge is ridiculously picturesque.

Ogden Brook

Ogden Brook

Looking back at Ogden Brook
Everything left of the brook is Greater Manchester, to the right Derbyshire

The climb up on the other side coincided with the appearance of a mixed flock of crows, jackdaws and rooks feeding amongst the sheep. The curlews on the slopes weren't happy with the passing crows, a couple resorted to distraction displays to head them off from anything valuable. 

Curlew

Curlew

Pennine Bridle Way 

Chiffchaffs, blackbirds and willow warblers sang from a plantation lying like a ribbon on a hill and a buzzard called noisily as it flew in and settled in the treetops. Looking at the rough descent in parts I concluded this walk would be better starting at Tintwistle and concluding with the gentle descent into Millbrook.

Arnfield Reservoir 

I'd been seeing Arnside Reservoir, my target destination, for a while but the paths approach it by going uphill then doing a sharp turn before finally descending by Arnfield Farm then joining Arnfield Lane over the brook to the Northeast of the reservoir then I had to cut down Crossgate Lane to Manchester Road for the bus stops. Pied wagtails flitted about the dry stone walls, mallards dabbled in small pools and lapwings fussed about in damp fields. Family groups of pied wagtails and starlings foraged by Arnfield Brook as swallows hawked low over the water.

Arnfield Brook

Robin, Arnfield Lane
Start the walk with a robin, end the walk with a robin.

Half a dozen Canada geese cruised Arnfield Reservoir as I just missed the bus to Glossop. Luckily I only had five minutes to wait for the bus to Ashton-under-Lyne on the other side and thence home. On paper I'd walked about four miles, it felt slightly longer.

Arnside Lane