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| Redshanks, turnstones and little egrets, Meols groyne |
The Leach's petrel passage had kicked up a few gears along the Wirral coast and there was a strong Westerly wind for them to be flying into, so they'd be more likely to fly close to shore and slow enough to give this old man a chance to get his eye in and identify one before it disappears into the distance. I decided I'd do a bit of seawatching from one of the seats above the revetment by Leasowe Lighthouse.
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| Leasowe Lighthouse |
I walked over from Moreton Station. The wind didn't feel so bad as I walked down the road and along the path past Kerr's Field. It hit like a brick as I stepped into the open area by the lighthouse and was bracing up on the sea wall. It was coming on high tide, the wind was blowing from the West, the birds were following the coast round the estuary and heading into it. Just right for seawatching. At first there wasn't much about: a few black-headed gulls nearby and a few herring gulls and lesser black-blacks tacking into the wind. A couple of great black-backs stood on a tiny foothold of mudbank. About a hundred oystercatchers were stubbornly hanging onto their mudbank until it sank beneath the waves.
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| Looking over to Wallasey |
Soon after the oystercatchers gave up and flew off things started happening. More herring gulls and lesser black-backs passed through. Nearly all the distant brown birds tacking into the wind were herring gulls or lesser black-backs, or unidentifiable one or others. I locked onto a distant bird ploughing its way through the wind in front of the wind turbines, a heavy, dark brown gull-like bird, only to lose track of it as a flock of pigeons careered across my line of view and blew away in the wind. It was probably a big juvenile herring gull.
I noticed a couple of somethings streaking across the waves about fifty yards out. I latched onto them, thinking they'd both be waders. Dashing ahead was a Leach's petrel, black with a white rump and a grey band across each wing. Miraculously it hardly seemed to move its wings as it shot headlong into the wind. Hot on its tail, wings working like billy-ho, was an almost white wader which it took me a few moments to recognise as a grey phalarope. Luckily that wind gave me those few moments and a bit to spare.
Ten minutes later a razorbill shot in and I realised how the Leach's petrel did the trick. The birds were flying South down the Lancashire coast into the Mersey Estuary and into the mouth of the river right up to the Wirral Coast then turning on a wingtip almost and they used their momentum to power them headlong into the wind and beyond. Later on, a guillemot doing the same trick a hundred yards out was harder to recognise immediately as I was fighting distance, windshake and its skimming through a trough behind high white horses. Luckily I picked it up on its way out and I confirmed what I thought I'd seen go in.
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| A vantage point over the groyne |
I gave it an hour then walked over to the groyne, partly to see what waders were roosting there, partly to see if any wheatears were about and mostly because I needed to stretch my legs. Redshanks, turnstones and a couple of knots shared the groyne with little egrets, an oystercatcher and a herring gull. There were no signs of wheatears either on the groyne or the grass, it must have been too windy for them.
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| Redshanks, little egrets and herring gull |
So far all the distant black birds flying low over the waves had been cormorants. A couple of dozen common scoters appeared and flew low over the waves. The birds at the back rose just that little too much over one wave and were caught by the wind. They towered up, over the waves and were deposited about fifty yards behind where they'd started from, which must have been hard work for them.
I was keeping an eye out for more petrels and auks closer to hand and was seeing mostly herring gulls, a few black-headed gulls and a great black-back. Then I saw a small black bullet skimming the waves past the groyne and out to sea. A puffin. I couldn't be sure if the grey look to its face was shadow or its being a juvenile bird, it was away too quick for me to tell.
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| Heading for Park Lane |
By then I was feeling windswept and interesting. It hadn't been a bad haul for an hour and a half's effort with binoculars. Judging by the reports I checked later there was plenty more out there I hadn't been seeing including a lot more Leach's petrels, some Arctic skuas and Manx shearwaters but I was happy enough with what I had. I dropped down into Meols Dunes and took the bridleway through to Park Lane.
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| Juvenile wheatear. And a horse. |
At Park Lane I turned left and headed past the paddocks back to Leasowe Common. I'd noticed there were plenty of pied wagtails skittering about with the horses when I had a look over from the sea wall, I wondered what else there might be. Plenty of woodpigeons and a couple of crows, of course. A flash of orange was a toffee paper blowing in the wind but that took my eye to a flock of linnets disconsolately sitting out the gusts of wind in a far corner and they took my eye to a juvenile wheatear hopping on and off a dividing fence. Further along I found a couple of juvenile white wagtails amongst the pied wagtails and starlings, and a couple more I couldn't decide one way or another.
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| Probably a juvenile pied wagtail, with starlings |
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| Curlew |
A curlew was feeding in the field by the gate. As I approached we both pretended we each hadn't seen the other and walked our separate ways.
I passed through the gate into the trees by the pond. A chiffchaff trialled a bit of song in one of the willows and goldfinches twittered in the hawthorn hedgerows along the path. Otherwise it was quiet. A couple of curlews rummaged about on Kerr's Field with the magpies and woodpigeons. As I'd walked in a Cetti's warbler sang from the Birkett as I passed by, it sang again as I passed on my way out and added a few jumbled bits of phrases which sounded like it was a young bird getting into practice for setting up a Winter territory.
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| The pond on Leasowe Common |
It had hardly been much of a walk, three and a bit miles, but I was jiggered. It was more than worth it for a good afternoon's bit of seawatching and some bonus passage passerines.
