Pennington Flash

Gadwall

After a busy morning I headed over to Pennington Flash. It was a hot, sunny day so it was likely to be very busy but there's plenty of shade about and I was hoping to find some waders on the ground exposed by lowering waters.

Pennington Brook

There were furtive mutterings from great tits and blue tits in the hedgerows as I walked in from St Helens Road and a coal tit called from the trees. I stopped at the bridge over the brook and watched a blue-tailed damselfly patrolling the banks. The car park was busy of people, cars and black-headed gulls, the Canada geese, mallards and mute swans were not for leaving the relatively cool bankside for the baking-hot concrete. Lots more of all of them loafed on the water while rafts of coots, lesser black-backs and herring gulls drifted in midwater. Great crested grebes cruised about with caravans of half-grown humbugs, cormorants fished and there was no sign of any swifts, swallows or martins.

Lapwing, pied wagtail and moorhen

The cool of the F.W.Horrocks Hide was a welcome relief. The spit had become a heavily-vegetated bulge in the landscape. Mallards, gadwalls and lapwings dozed by the waterside while woodpigeons, moorhens and pied wagtails fossicked about. At the end of the spit the usual selection of herring gulls, cormorants and black-headed gulls loafed and preened. A raft of a dozen or so each of great crested grebes and tufted ducks cruised the channel beyond the spit.

The spit

The Kidney Pool 

Mute cygnets

Robins and chiffchaffs squeaked in the trees as I walked down to the Tom Edmondson Hide. Brown hawkers patrolled the reeds by the Kidney Pool. The pools at the Tom Edmondson Hide were busier than they have been, occupied by a large family of mute swans and a couple of gadwalls. Southern hawkers skimmed over the grass, large whites and speckled woods fluttered about the brambles at the side. A heron made a racket as it flew in and decided not to settle, it wasn't apparent what had put it off.

I had high hopes of waders at Ramsdales and found me just the one lapwing. Two teal-sized ducks turned out to be gadwall ducklings, they didn't have enough wings yet for the distinctive white speculum feathers. A pair of teals were dozing in the shade of a tree by the side.

Walking towards the canal 

It was too warm for a long walk in exposed conditions so I decided I'd head back whence I came which is how I found myself walking round the flash and on to Slag Lane instead. Chiffchaffs squeaked in the trees, a blackcap told me off and magpies clattered about. Woodpigeons and gulls flew to and fro. Meadow browns, common blues and large whites fluttered about the wayside, red admirals and speckled woods the hedgerows. A common hawker zipped by, I think they're the least common hawkers round these parts. More expected were the brown hawkers and Southern hawkers patrolling the pathways and tree canopies. 

I stopped at the viewing point by the reeds to look at the end of the spit and the bits of Ramsdales scrapes I couldn't see from the hide, distracted all the while by brown hawkers and a plunge-diving common tern. Mallards, black-headed gulls, lapwings… and skittering across the mud between two patches of reeds a little ringed plover dwarfed by a juvenile pied wagtail. 

Mute swan

I started to see common blue damselflies flitting about in the grass as I approached the little inlet. There weren't the swarms of my last visit and there were no signs of any emperor dragonflies. A couple of Southern hawkers hawked low over the water, keeping away from the mute swans and mallards loafing on the water.

The inlet

Black-headed gulls and common tern

As I carried on walking I noticed that the low water on the flash was exposing more of its industrial heritage. What are generally isolated groups of rocks pointing out of the water had become a sequence of lines suggesting the course of the old railway that served Bickershaw Colliery. These provided loafing places for black-headed gulls and common terns. One of the great crested grebes still had a nest on the go that was now on a small raised platform.

Common blue 

It was definitely too warm for a walk across the rucks to the canal and thence Plank Lane. I stuck to the bankside. There were a lot of common blues skittering about the parched sward. In a couple of places they were joined by small numbers of small blues. The common blues stayed still long enough for a few photos, the small blues didn't want to play and spent most of their time undercover or feeding upside down from kidney vetch flowers. A couple of azure damselflies sunned themselves on rocks. A couple of the gulls circling high overhead didn't look right so I had a look through the binoculars. They were a couple of young sparrowhawks riding the thermals. I didn't notice the third sparrowhawk, an adult female, until she intervened when a lesser black-back circled over to torment them.

The rucks

Pennington Flash 

Willow warblers and goldfinches bounced about in the willow scrub. A female common scoter had been reported on the flash earlier but I wasn't seeing anything that might be it. A few tufted ducks and mallards chugged by, more mallards lurked by the reeds by the sailing club. A big raft of coots were diving for a freshwater mussel bed that's usually too deep for them to reach. Most of the noise was made by three great crested grebes that were being allowed out on their own while the parents went fishing.

Great crested grebes
Humbugs playing at being the Loch Ness monster

Lapwing

It struck me as odd watching young lapwings feeding at the waterside alongside paddling children but I suppose they don't know any different. As far as the lapwings are concerned we're probably not much different to cattle come for a wallow.

Heading for Slag Lane 

I walked into the willow scrub to Slag Lane. A mixed flock of long-tailed tits, chiffchaffs and willow warblers kept me on my toes. I'd just missed the 588 back to Leigh and the next one was due in an hour so I walked into Plank Lane for the 584 due in thirty-five minutes. This is the bus from Crankwood. I don't know that area so I decided to walk a few stops up Crankwood Road just for a nosy, stopping when the bus going up to the terminus passed by. I spent the next five minutes watching a charm of about forty goldfinches feeding on the thistles across the road. Which is no bad way to pass the time.

Leighton Moss

Marsh harrier

The weather front presaged by that swarm of sand martins in Flixton came to pass. It heaved down Monday night and there were intermittent heavy showers throughout Tuesday. In between the showers it was like being in the steam room at a Turkish bath and I quickly gave up on my effort at having a walk. It was cooler today, low sixties with a strong wind knocking it down a lot, and fresher. I decided it would be a good day to be dodging showers on the train and nipping between the hides at Leighton Moss. The day had started very early and I wasn't up to anything energetic.

I got myself an old man's explorer ticket and headed North. There was not a lot of anything in the fields of Lancashire as the train passed by. The pools by the coastal hides at Leighton Moss were bone dry and cracked, a few black-headed gulls and little egrets seemed to be loafing there by habit. The tides were highish so the Kent and Leven were running high as the train passed over the estuaries. A couple of curlews and some lesser black-backs prodded about on muddy river banks, little egrets lurked in creeks, the dry salt marshes in between were left to carrion crows and swallows.

There had been a couple of very heavy showers along the way. I got off at Dalton and was treated to another in the ten minutes I had to wait for the train back. Even the herring gulls and jackdaws were grounded.

Coots

It was raining steadily when I arrived at Leighton Moss. I can't complain, it's badly needed. The pool at Lilian's Hide was crowded with gadwalls, mallards and coots clustered in the deep bits where the water went halfway up the shins of one of the three great white egrets, most elsewhere it barely wet the ankles. (Yes, I know a bird's "knee" is actually the ankle, the alternative non-technical label is: "bit the toes stick out of," which is more typing.) Four adult mute swans loafed on a mud bank that is usually a thin line of short reeds, I could see no sign of any cygnets. And all the while a swarm of sand martins and a couple of swifts whizzed low over the pool.

Gadwalls

A moorhen chick demonstrated why they're part of the staple diet of gulls and marsh harriers. In the end its parent gave up trying to call it back into the reeds and came out into the open with its sibling so it could keep an eye on it.

Moorhens

Great white egret, gadwalls and mallards

Luckily for the moorhens the marsh harrier that came over to the pool stayed on the other side, putting the wind up the gadwalls which all flew into the deepest channel they could find on the pool, which was dead centre and not very deep.

Marsh harrier

Me and the camera have a fight nearly every day but every so often we do something like the photos I got of that marsh harrier.

Marsh harrier 

Marsh harrier 

From the Sky Tower the reserve was a sea of reeds with pockets of mud and puddles. The rain tried its best.

From the Sky Tower 

The walk down to the Tim Jackson and Griesdale hides were mainly quiet. The squeaks of robins, chiffchaffs and willow warblers. A quietly singing reed warbler. A telling-off by a wren.

Walking down to the reedbeds

The main drain on the reserve

At the Griesdale Hide 

At the Tim Jackson Hide 

A white-rumped sandpiper had turned up at Meols. I toyed with the idea of chasing after it on the way home but the two o'clock early alarm call asserted itself. I went home, did not pass go, did not collect £200.

Salford Quays

Lesser black-backs
(I rather like the air of menace in this photo)

It was another nice day and I wasn't disposed to do anything with it. I've found the birdwatching this past couple of weeks a bit dispiriting. They've been lovely walks and I've had my fresh air and exercise and all that but the shortage of birds has been inescapable. Much, much more than the usual July lull. The local swifts had their farewell party a couple of weeks ago, screaming round the chimney tops in the twilight. A couple linger on near the station, I hope this means they have a nest with mouths to feed on the go. Blackcaps and whitethroats, similarly, seem to have shut up shop early. It feels somehow like something is broken.

Lostock Park 

Fresh air and exercise is good for the spirit so after this morning's fifteen minute downpour I headed over to the park to see what was about on my local patch.

Three magpies, two woodpigeons, a great tit and a black-headed gull passing through.

Ordinarily this time of year I'd be hearing enigmatic squeaks and scufflings in the undergrowth and be scratching my head trying to identify them. Today, nothing. More life in a tramp's vest. But then, everything's so parched, even after fifteen minutes of rain, it must have an impact on the food and water supplies.

Barton Clough 

Thoroughly demoralised I walked through and got the 250, got off near Sir Matt Busby Way and walked through to Wharfside to see what was on the Ship Canal. By golly, I shall see a body of water today, I told myself. And so I did

Manchester Ship Canal

Black-headed gulls and juvenile lesser black-back
The adult black-headed gulls were in that odd grey-headed stage of moult.

For most of the gulls the breeding season is over though I'm still seeing a few large lesser black-back chicks on factory rooves. A raft of lesser black-backs and a few herring gulls bathed by the Lowry. Mute swans, coots and Canada geese drifted about the Central Bay. Sand martins were much in evidence, a dozen were feeding by this bank and more zipped across my line of vision as I scanned the gulls. There were maybe fifty black-headed gulls about and they seemed a bit skittish, tending not to settle on the water and fidgeting about whenever they were on the dockside furniture. Half a dozen very young-looking lesser black-backs begged by Clipper Quay and were extravagantly ignored by the adults at the scene.

Walking to Pomona

I walked over to Pomona, adding a couple of cormorants and a mallard to the tally. Walking back, a grey wagtail was heard and not seen, I suspect it was on the walkway on the Salford bank.

Walking back past Clipper Quay I noticed that three mallards and a moorhen had joined the crowd and the adult lesser black-backs had moved on. One of the young lesser black-backs took to the sky and spent the next three minutes being chased round the block by an adult until it got bored and flew over to the Lowry for a bath.

Even the Ship Canal's low

There was a steady traffic of large gulls of all ages, three lesser black-backs for every herring gull, drifting in and out of that raft by the Lowry. I kept my eyes peeled, the "usual" yellow-legged gull had been reported again earlier this week and I might strike lucky today. I wasn't seeing anything likely on the water. One subadult gull flying over the canal caught my eye but I had shockingly bad views of it because most of the time the sun was right behind it. It might have been a subadult yellow-legged gull but with the views I was getting it might just as easily have been a rather full-breasted lesser black-back with a chunky beak. 

Central Bay 

As I approached the Imperial War Museum another batch of gulls flew in from the Ontario Basin. I was in luck: one of them was an adult — the usual adult? — yellow-legged gull. It's an odd thing about yellow-legged gulls: compared to herring gulls, and even lesser black-backs, they always look freshly laundered. Perhaps it's just that that shade of grey seems to emphasise the whiteness of the head. The raft was dispersed when the tourist boat came in to dock, the extensive black tips to the primaries on the yellow-legged gull had the rather squared-off look, as if the tip of the wing had been dipped in a pot of paint. I notice that every time.

So I got my hundred species for the month after all. In snooker they apologise for a fluke. I'm a bit irritated with myself at the sense of relief I got that I made it.

I got the 30 to the Trafford Centre and the 25 back home. More lesser black-backs flew in to roost a the quays and a red admiral chased the bus out of its territory as we approached the bus station. The butterflies are in football hooligan on holiday mode this Summer, I think the heat's getting to them.

Clifton Country Park

Nuthatch

It was a lot cooler today — low to mid seventies in old money — and overcast. The mystery of the morning was why the collared dove should suddenly start singing at twenty to three in the morning and then suddenly stop. In my befuddled half-asleep state for a moment I wondered if a tawny owl was in the garden.

The lake at Clifton Country Park 

For some reason I felt achy and tired and headachy and I let the need to run an errand be the excuse not to go on the planned excursion for the day. Instead I played bus station bingo, got the 22 into Clifton and went for a walk round the country park.

Mute cygnet

The mute swans had well-grown cygnets in tow. I worried that one had a length of fishing line in its beak but it turned out to be a long length of fibre from a Himalayan balsam stem it had been chewing. The black-headed gulls had plenty of young birds with them, the adults were in that strange grey-headed phase where the white Winter plumage isn't quite replacing all the brown feathers on the head. The youngsters were in various stages of looking very tea-stained. The coots had small chicks, the mallard ducklings were full-grown and capable, just, of flight, and all the tufted ducks were adults.

Black-headed gull

River Irwell 

I walked round to the bridge over the Irwell into Bolton. The beach on the bend here always looks like there should be waders on it and there never is. Up North there'd be a common sandpiper sure as eggs. A few Canada geese cruised upstream, black-headed gulls and magpies caught midges by the outflow from the water treatment works and grey wagtails bobbed about on rocks by the bankside.

The path by the river

I turned back and took the path that follows the river downstream. It's a higgledy piggledy sort of a path, up and down like a rollercoaster, lurching round trees and here and there showing signs of disappearing into either the river or the hollow ground on the other side. It's rather fun when it's not muddy.

Mallards

The views of the river are mostly obscured by trees, which is frustrating when you can hear a kingfisher. Every so often there's a good view of the river, I found that if there weren't grey wagtails about there were mallards. I caught up with the kingfisher a few hundred yards downstream when it flew down a small course of rapids.

Grey wagtails

The birds in the woods by the path were mostly silent and skulking. Except the young robins that were showing off a bit. A pair of nuthatches were so busy being silent and skulking they didn't notice me standing by the tree they were feeding in. 

Juvenile robin 

The river was a lot lower than usual and was exposing large expanses of the sandstone strata it runs over and through. Brown hawkers patrolled over the shallows and rapids. My first common blue damselfly of the day was in the beak of a young grey wagtail. I was looking out for dippers and having no luck. I was also looking for goosanders and wasn't having much better luck until I spotted a couple of young redheads loafing on a shelf of damp sandstone. They'd spotted me first, barked and swam off downstream. It only occurred to me then that I had had no idea what noise a goosander makes.

The path by the river

I followed the path round as it turned away from the river to a little pond where common blue damselflies swarmed, pond skaters zipped about on the surface and broad-bodied chasers made inroads on the midge population. A little further on I had a sit-down to decide which paths to take back, having conceded it was too warm for the walk into Prestwich, and I was serenaded by a blackcap. Which probably just objected to my being there. I knew there's a bridge over the railway this side of the motorway so there should be a path into Clifton, I decided to take that as it was the shortest route to a bus stop.

At this point the knees had words. They were not nice words.

Luckily I knew there was a bridge there so I was looking for a path to it, it turned out to be an inconspicuous gap in some elderberry bushes. My knees asked if we really should be doing all them they steps, little did I know what lay ahead. The first few hundred yards on the other side was not the prettiest stretch of The Salford Trail but there was the consolation of watching a buzzard looking out for anything flushed out of cover by passing trains. 

The Salford Trail into Clifton

Then the path turned into some woodland. And lots of steps. At the fourth flight I noticed a path haring off to the left in the direction I was headed so I took that. Which turned out to be a gently sloping meander up the steep bank ending with a mad scramble up to the official path as it goes by Clifton Farm. Which all in all was a very nice walk even though it was very quiet birdwise.

I'd no sooner joined the path than I was passing St Anne's Church, which was dead handy as the bus stop on Manchester Road is by the front gate.

I was shattered when I got home and wondered why until the sensible voice in the back of my head I ignore a lot pointed out that even though it's a lot cooler than it was last week, by any objective measure today was A Hot Day. I'll try to bear this in mind.

Hindley

Broad-bodied chaser

I've been going out for walks looking to find birds and I'm finding butterflies and dragonflies so I thought today I'd go out looking for butterflies and dragonflies and see what birds turn up. Mid-afternoon I headed out to Amberswood to look for Norfolk hawkers.

I got off the 132 at the Gregory Street stop and walked into Amberswood at the Manchester Road entrance. Almost immediately I bumped into a Southern hawker and felt a bit hurt by its complete lack of interest in me. To be fair, there was a banquet of tiny flies rising from the brambles.

Walking in from Manchester Road 

The only time of the year the gorse isn't in flower

A young great spotted woodpecker was calling from the trees about fifty yards deep into the woods. The call was so prolonged and insistent I had to double-check it wasn't a green woodpecker. The birds closer to hand were nearly all silent, an occasional contact call from a blue tit or great tit, a tut from a robin or a wren, the odd rattle from a magpie for five seconds of song from a woodpigeon. The most conspicuous birds were the dunnocks, which sort of tells you how it was.

Holly blue

In contrast, the holly blues, red admirals and large whites were all over the wayside brambles and nettles. The holly blues stayed still long enough to let me try and take their photos, something I've giving up on at home. Approaching the lake I was rather surprised to hear a couple of garden warblers singing at each other from either side of the path. The only other warbler I'd heard in the woods was the occasional squeak from a chiffchaff.

Amberswood Lake 

Reed warblers quietly sang to themselves at the lakeside and every so often I'd see one flitting between patches of reeds. Young blue tits monopolised the fat feeders at the corner by the paths, the adults fidgeted their way through the reeds. I found just the one reed bunting, and that was heard not seen. Reed buntings prefer to sit on a vantage point to sing, this one was deep in the depths of the reeds. 

Broad-bodied chaser 

The dragonflies were aggressively more conspicuous. Half a dozen brown hawkers zipped round me as I tried to see the reed bunting, the nearest passes close enough for me to hear their wing beats as they shot past my ear. A lot of the time they ran straight at me, veering away at the last minute like a game of chicken. For all there were lots of midges and mosquitos about none of them were getting close enough to land, let alone bite. A very unnerving alternative to citronella repellents. 

There were a couple of smaller hawkers, more stubby than the Southern hawker that passed by and predominantly brown with green stripes. I looked for the green eyes that would confirm them as Norfolk hawkers, easier said than done as they zipped around in the crowd. They were a lot shier than the brown hawkers, always keeping out of arm's reach. It took a few minutes before I could be sure they were Norfolk hawkers — head on, the brown hawkers had bright chestnut brown, almost red, faces while those of the Norfolk hawkers looked pale yellow, it was only when they veered and I got a side-on view that the milky bright green of the eyes became apparent and it took a few goes to be sure I wasn't just wishing it so. Another puzzling factor, almost certainly down to refractions and reflections, was that when they were flying at me the Norfolk hawkers appeared to have a golden sheen to the wings, nothing like as deep as the rich amber tones of the brown hawkers. Seen from below the wings were dead clear. The broad-bodied chasers posing for the camera on stems were a much more straightforward proposition.

Broad-bodied chaser 

Broad-bodied chaser 

Amberswood Lake 

Out on the lake the great crested grebes had a nest on the go, a couple of young black-headed gulls sat on the water catching emerging midges and the coots were busy feeding their second brood. A couple of dozen mallards loafed on the bankside muttering at passersby.

Meadow brown

On the way out to Liverpool Road the drifts of thistles by the pathside were buzzing with bees and butterflies. For all that there were plenty of commas, red admirals, peacocks and painted ladies the meadow browns and gatekeepers outnumbered them three to one.

Gatekeeper 

I crossed the road over to Low Hall where woodpigeons and song thrushes sang in the trees. Mallards, moorhens and the pair of mute swans moved in slow motion as they fed on the pond. Even the coots didn't have the energy to squabble. Titmice bounced through the trees, blackbirds and robins disappeared into the shadows under trees and the first jackdaws and woodpigeons flew overhead to roost. 

Low Hall 

There were fewer butterflies about than at Amberswood, but lots more damselflies. The dipping pool, particularly, was busy with common blue damselflies and I noticed a couple of blue-tailed damselflies zipping through some sedges.

Common blue damselfly 

I checked the bus times and found that the 559 to Bolton was due in ten minutes. Given that I'd miss the 132 back to the Trafford Centre whichever way I got back to Hindley town centre I decided to get the 559 and get the 20 back to the Trafford Centre from Over Hulton. In the ten minutes I waited for the 559 there was a definite passage of peacock butterflies over the road from Low Hall to Amberswood, perhaps they were heading to roost, too. Or perhaps they'd heard the thistles were doing good business.