Urban birdwatching: Liverpool

Cormorant, Speke Hall

Lying awake, I'd noted the progression of the dawn chorus from the robin starting to sing at the darkest hour, soon joined by the blackbird, the magpie that chattered through as the first grey light was showing, the woodpigeon singing at daybreak as the carrion crows woke up, then the wren and the blackcap kicking in and the robin shortly joining them and the blackcap didn't stop for hours. At five past eight I was still wide awake and told myself I might as well get up, it was one of those nights without sleep and the next thing I knew it was half ten. I'll probably sleep through the dawn chorus come Dawn Chorus Day.

Given the circumstances I decided I'd have an easy day of it and try and avoid much Bank Holiday frivolity. The great-tailed grackle is still singing at Speke Hall and I'm still irritated at having such a fleeting look at it so I headed thataway.

Speke Hall 

I got the train to Liverpool South Parkway, got the 80a to Speke and walked down to Speke Hall. There were lots of small birds about in the parkland and precious few to be seen. Blackcaps, wrens and robins sang from the hedgerows, blackbirds and song thrushes sang from trees, whitethroats and greenfinches sang from hawthorn bushes, and I was seeing woodpigeons and magpies.

There was a Bank Holiday event going on at Speke Hall so I kept my distance. 

Walking round the pond

I took advantage of the results of the unusually dry and windy April weather to do a circuit of the pond, in ordinary circumstances one ten-yard stretch of the circumference would be impassible. Moorhens, mallards and a pair of coots pottered about. The coots were making such a production of their not nesting that I took it for granted they had a nest somewhere. I'd just completed the trickiest part of the circuit — limboing under a fallen tree then crossing a muddy rill by walking along a stick toe to heel — when I spotted the nest and the chicks under the tree I was leaning against to get my balance on a muddy slope.

Coot with nestlings

I left the pond and walked out onto the meadows. The grackle had been reported as singing from a copse in the corner of the meadow nearest the roads. This is all new territory for me, I wasn't sure whether or not the copse was part of the field margin. The best bet seemed to be to do a circuit of the meadow following the margin and see if I could hear or see anything unusual.

The meadows

There were plenty of singing blackbirds and whitethroats and the rattling of magpies. Every so often the soundscape would be punctuated by passing carrion crows, gulls or, a couple of times, ravens. Black figures flying across the treeline were jackdaws. As I approached one corner I realised that some of the trees in the next corner stood out like a little island in the meadow. I was also starting to hear noises that weren't quite magpie or blackbird. 

The copse in question 

As I got nearer to that corner, and that copse, something in the trees let out an oddly metallic whoop. This was followed by a sporadic squeaks, chatters, croaks and whoops. Some of the sounds were similar to the blackbirds and magpies in the background, some reminded me of starlings and mynah birds. It took a while to actually see the bird, it was sitting midway up a mostly bare tree surrounded by trees in full leaf. Irnoically, I got the best view of it as I was walking back and the bird jumped up near the top of the tree. I contemplated walking back then realised that even if the bird didn't take objection there'd be no point as the lay of the land meant that the closer I got the more the grackle would be hidden by leaves. I'd seen the bird and heard it, and for a lot longer than my last fleeting vision, so I was content.

Great-tailed grackle
The least-worst of a lot of bad photos.

Walking back past the pond a cormorant was sat by the bank drying its wings not really a lot fussed as I passed by. On the other side of the pond a couple of ravens were tormenting a couple of carrion crows in the treetops until they all got bored with it and flew off in separate directions.

Cormorant

It wasn't yet teatime and I'd bought a Saveaway ticket so I thought I'd drift around the outskirts of Liverpool visiting places I've not been in yonks. The 82a was the next bus to come along so I got that as far as Sefton Park and had a bit of a wander.

Sefton Park 

The soundscape of Liverpudlian municipal parks is nigh identical to those in Greater Manchester, including the background screech of ring-necked parakeets. Blackbirds, blackcaps, chiffchaffs, robins, wrens and song thrushes sang, titmice quietly fossicked about in the undergrowth while magpies and woodpigeons clattered about. Canada geese, mallards and coots cruised about on the pond, herring gulls and lesser black-backs elbowed the waterfowl out of the way and scrabbled for food thrown for the birds.

Sefton Park 

The plan was to walk through the park and get the 68 which goes to Bootle and get off at one of the train stations along the way. The plan was. There were no buses stopping round that end because of diversions so I ended up walking up Greenbank Road to get a bus into Liverpool from Smithdown Road. I popped into Greenbank Park along the way to have a look at more Canada geese, mallards, coots and moorhens and hear more blackbirds, blackcaps and robins.

Greenbank Park 

I struck lucky in Liverpool and only had to wait twenty minutes for the train straight back home, which saved on a lot of messing about. I'd had a nice trip out, I'd revisited a few places and the birdwatching was plenty good enough for a Bank Holiday Monday.

Garston and Speke

Jackdaws, Garston 

I thought I'd start the week with a twitch, so the week started with a cancelled train. Start as you mean to go on I always say. And it turned out today was the day that ring-necked parakeet stopped being a garden flyover and became a visitor.

Ring-necked parakeet
A first-Winter bird lacking the pink ring round its neck.

Ring-necked parakeet 

The train services were having a Monday meltdown. I had to get the train into Manchester to get the train out to Liverpool (I wasn't waiting until lunchtime for the next one) and we spent quarter of an hour stuck at Castlefield Junction. The departure boards at Oxford Road were something to behold, but not in a nice way. I eventually got to Liverpool South Parkway, only a bit over an hour late because I'd bought a ticket that allowed me to get the express, and the rest of the day was pretty plain sailing.

I was chasing the great-tailed grackle that's turned up in the trees around Speke Hall. Great-tailed grackle is one of those birds that make you run through your rules for your British list. It's not a bird likely to come to Britain under its own steam. There are lots of stories of them hitching rides on boats for a cruise around the Caribbean. If one's got here it's vanishingly unlikely it wasn't a ship-assisted passage. Species that have only occurred in the UK due to ship-assisted arrival get put into Category E of the Official British List, along with escapes and releases of exotic birds and don't count (but are recorded for study — today's exotic release may be tomorrow's invasive species). In my British list I differentiate between ship-assisted birds and escapes, my list, my rules. The bird brought itself here, it just didn't fly or walk. The lack of intention to come here is no different to a long-distant migrant getting caught in a hurricane. You may have different rules for your list. Your list, your rules.

There's a fair bit of parkland around Speke Hall for a magpie-sized bird to play hide and seek in which probably explains the sporadic bursts of reports of sightings and gaps where nothing was reported at all. The last report, yesterday lunchtime, had it in trees by the Estuary Industrial Estate. I decided I'd start there, it's closest to the station, and walk round into the Speke and Garston Coastal Park and into the grounds of Speke Hall from there. That way, if I dipped on the grackle I'd have got some birdwatching in. And I was pretty sure I was going to dip on the grackle.

All the birds that were roughly magpie-sized and shaped in the industrial estate were magpies. Mallards puttered about in the ponds by the roadside while moorhens fossicked about in the verges. A crowd of jackdaws rummaged about in the grass at the corner of the road.

Speke and Garston Coastal Park

I dropped down into Sefton and Garston Coastal Park. Halfway down the steps I spotted a male kestrel coming in to hunt just before a great tit sounded the alarm. Even taking the kestrel into account it was very quiet in the open scrub land, just a few magpies bouncing round. The trees by the sailing club were a bit more productive with a small group of blue tits and great tits and a couple of bullfinches rummaging about in the lower branches.

Along the slipway

The tide was low so I walked halfway down the slipway to see what was on the river. There were plenty of birds about, all of them keeping their distance. Out on the mud banks of the river black-headed gulls and herring gulls loafed well away from a pair of great black-backs. Closer by, teal, redshanks and a ringed plover bustled about the end of the slipway. There were more redshanks and ringed plovers with the curlews on the bank downstream of the slipway. There were also some possible dunlins and a wader that might have been a knot or a grey plover, the light defeated me before they scuttled out of sight. Upstream there were small groups of teals and mallards at the waterside and some more curlews stalking the mud.

This time last year I was heading East down the dodgy path towards Oglet. This time I followed the path going North and into the Speke Hall estate. The hedgerows were busy with robins, blackbirds and dunnocks, chaffinches pinked and song thrushes sang in the trees.

Walking towards Speke Hall 

I bumped into a couple who had first seen and heard the grackle a few weeks ago but hadn't the first idea what it was until somebody else saw it and identified it last week. They'd seen it again since and told me if I carried on the path I was walking I might strike lucky. I wished them luck with the hummingbird hunting they were planning for their holidays.

The big pond

There were plenty of carrion crows, jackdaws and magpies about in the trees. Moorhens and mallards puttered about in the big pond. It was a very agreeable walk. I was overindulging my yen for landscape photography when I noticed a bird flying this way from a bank of trees near the industrial estate. It was roughly magpie-sized and shaped but wasn't a magpie: it was all glossy bluish black and the body to tail proportion was wrong for a magpie, there was a lot of tail and it flared out at the end instead of tapering. I had about fifteen seconds' view of a great-tailed grackle before it disappeared behind the conifers between me and the hall. By the time I'd put my 'phone away and dug out the camera it had gone. I spent a short while looking for it but gave up, I'd already been luckier than I'd deserved to be.

Speke Hall 

Stockton's Wood 

A wander round Stockton's Wood was picturesque but quiet, when I emerged into the parkland along The Walk the small birds I hadn't been seeing in the woods were fizzing about the trees. The trees by the gatehouse were very busy with blue tits, the great spotted woodpecker and jay in the trees on the other side of the road were harder to spot.

Ivy berries 

The Walk

I'd bought a Saveaway so I had a bit of a wander round for an hour or so before coming back to the river. I got off the train at Aigburth and walked down to Otterspool Park for a stroll along the promenade in the fading light. The tide was high and the wind was bitterly cold. Even in this murky light I could pick up the big rafts of black-headed gulls and smaller rafts of large gulls, mostly herring gulls with a handful of lesser black-backs. A couple of great black-backs upset some herring gulls. A few common gulls blew in with the wind and headed upstream. Cormorants and oystercatchers headed in the same direction, probably to the roots beyond Hale.

Otterspool Promenade 

I'd started the day with ring-necked parakeets and so I ended the day with them screeching in the trees near Aigburth Station.