We had a trip out to the new rspb reserve at Hesketh Outer Marsh today had a guided walk with the warden Graham Clarkson Not many species of birds seen but it was at low tide and will be a lot better at high tide Birds seen Peregrine, over 1000 Pink feet who must have got sick of the Helicopter coming off Warto...
A wander down the perimeter of Eccles Sewage Works was interesting with over a 100 Pied Wagtails feeding on and around the sewage beds,also at least 150 Black Headed Gulls ,2 Herring gulls and a few Jackdaws also feeding on the beds.On the adjacent Ship Canal there were another 50 plus Black Headed Gul...
2/5/09 early am
HOBBY - 1 showed well at 7.15am by the river from Welkin road before belting off low east.
Also
1 singing Garden Warbler
3 singing Blackcaps
3 singing Chiffchaffs
Stock Dove
Dipper
Goosander
Friday 25 July Brown Hawker Emperor 50+ Common Blue Damselflies Common Blue 2 Speckled Wood 4 Large White Large numbers of Meadow Brown, Gatekeeper and Small Skipper Cinnabar caterpillars on the Ragwort Some rather nice Teasels too
16th August. 4 Dunlin, 2 Ringed Plover, 40+ Pied Wagtail, c15 Linnet, c130 gulls - numbers of gulls has been much higher than this recently - today mostly Black-headed - but 4 Common and 3 Lesser Black-backed also present. c220 Lapwing, 30 House Martin, Begging juveniles of both Greenfinch and Goldf...
Sightings from Shell pool and the Bassell site Sunday 20th March At least six Buzzard either overhead or displaying in the area Sparrowhawk 1 Kestrel 1 Canada Goose 12 Mallard 23 Tufted Duck 30 Coot 8 Moorhen 8 Little Grebe 6 Cormorant 1 over Grey Heron 1 Pheasant 1 Black Headed Gull100+ Lesser Black Ba...
Morning visit with dog included:- Grey Wagtail Stock Dove Shelduck Peregrine Great Spotted Woodpecker Nuthatch Coal Tit Buzzard Shoveler Teal Gadwall Lapwing Cormorant Bullfinch + other usual species (45+ in total) A pair of Scaup were on Neumans Flash apparently and I heard a Lesser Spotted Woo...
20/11/07 early morning Ring-necked Parakeet (fem) - perched up near the Obelisk, quite happily chuckling and talking away to itself. With no leaves on the trees this was the best views I`ve ever had of this species. 11 Nuthatches. 2 Goldcrests. 3 Coal Tits. 3 G.S.Woodpecker. 2 Kestrel. Teal. 12 Gadw...
I've recently returned from a classic week on the Scillies, 14th-19th October, 2011. This year was probably my best in the five years i've been going. Upon arrival I didn't know what direction to go and what to see first such was the cast of long-staying rarities present. There were good numbers of sca...
A short holiday to France with my good friend Ethan and his partner. For a bit of context, Ethan and I both studied Zoology with Herpetology and met at university; neither him nor his partner are particularly interested in birds but I hope to see some interesting continental species along with the rep...
Just got back from my annual pilgrimage to the Mecca of seawatching,and although it was poor by Cornish standards I still managed to see:-
Great Shearwater (1)
Cory's (1)
Balearic Shearwater(20+)
Sooty Shearwater(15+)
Storm Petrel(40+)
Bonxie(12)
Arctic Skua(3)
Plus all the usual sus...
4th March.
Visited this area of Oldham for the first time ever today - despite having lived in the area for 20+ years! Really will have to try and get out a bit more
On the upper reservoir - 1 Little Grebe, 2 redhead Goosanders and a pair of Tufted Duck. 170+ Black-headed Gulls, 2 Herring Gull, 1 Lesser...
1 Green Woodpecker showing well 1 Pochard Shoveler Shelduck Teal Reed Bunting Great Crested Grebe -- Edited by Ian McKerchar on Wednesday 3rd of January 2018 03:16:05 PM
At Marbury today with Henry C looking for the reported Hawfinch - no luck. Nothing at Haydns Pool either except the rangers building a Sand Martin bank. However, on the mere we had excellent views of a couple of Kingfisher, a Raven over and at the end really close sightings of a Water Rail - didn't realis...
Thought I'd start a site report thread for one of my local patches, and today is as good a day as any because after nearly twenty years of trying up here, I found my first RING OUZEL. A superb male, it was up by the road to Rowarth on the south side just after the bridleway track, but soon did a vanishing act. A...
Having not seen any peregrines for several weeks I thought they had finally vacated for the winter. This afternoon though, I saw 2 (1 adult, 1 1st year), chasing each other around St Peter's square for about 5 minutes, before settling on the Town Hall, just before dusk, approx 4pm. Not sure if they were...
Xmas Day morning - driving through Deeside Industrial Estate on approach to the Dee Bridge:
2 buzzard
1 kestrel
1 little egret
1 fieldfare
flock of approx 20 redwing
lots of lapwing (couldn't count)
Not a bad start to the day!
Spent Sunday wandering round the Fylde area. Nice views of the Ross's Gooose with approx 2500 Pink-feet. Picked up a Purple Sandpiper with the Turnstones and Redshank on Fleetwood boating lake Spent high tide watching the waders at Fluke Hall - Oystercatchers, Grey Plovers, Sanderling, Dunlin et...
Had an early walk around lower brushes up to Walkerwood reservoir
blue tits
great tits
wood pigeon 14
magpie 5
blackbird 3
blackheaded gulls 48
canada geese 37
robin 3
longtailed tits 6
mallard 2
pheasant
greenfinch 3
wren 1
house sparrows 4
mistlethrush
chaffinch
goldfinch
jac...
Quite a sizeable Starling roost is starting to build up at Rostherne (viewed from behind the church) - not as big as previous years but worth looking at. The early arrivals were met by a Sparrowhawk waiting for dinner
37 species recorded today for the Bird Atlas / GM Breeding Atlas including pairs of the following: Great Crested Grebe Oystercatcher Coot (2 pairs) Tufted Duck Grey Partidge Also seen 4 Snipe, a Stonechat, a Sand Martin (the first of the year was here on 30th March), a Kestrel and a Sparrowhawk. The hi...
Called into the park on my way to work this morning (8.40 -9.15) , to see if the 2 parakeets were still around (saw them on monday). They were there in the same holly bushes just east of the lake, being very vocal, a m and f.
I was surprised by how much other stuff was around too - Its only a short walk from hom...
My first visit (approx 3 hours): Kestrel Goldfinch Nuthatch Coot Canada Goose Little Grebe Woodpigeon Carrion Crow Pied Wagtail Swallow Swift Buzzard Although the gardens seem to concentrate on ornamental horticulture, (which attract plenty of pollinators and butterflies), there is plenty o...
I think with this post i will tell you about some of the great places i visited for birding around north wales and Anglesey,starting with the latter.Cemlyn on Anglesey is a brilliant spot on the west coast with waders in abundance dunlin,turnstone,sanderling, oyster catchers,redshank,curlew,r...
A full-on twitch to Musselburgh for the recently split American White-winged Scoter with Paul Greenall (our impeccable driver), Ian Lyth and Roger Baker. Alarm set for a brain-shattering 01.30 and our journey north began inauspiciously with delays due to i-phone updates and motorway closures....
