Spent an hour or so at Marshside this afternoon as the fog ebbed and flowed around the estuary - quite peaceful really.
Little Grebe yikkering away in the SSSI ditch reedbed from Hesketh Road, and good numbers of Teal and Wigeon at the bottom of Marshside One.
Blackbird singing on the golf course.
The first Avocets arrived back on the marsh not much later than this last year, but today the cold slowly gnawed into my bones as I 'scoped Marshside One, so in the end I drove up to the Sandgrounders Hide.
Where have all the Pochard gone? Only 5 on the Sandplant Lagoon.
A constantly diving Little Grebe on the lagoon tried my patience as I tried to get a decent pic of it (see above) - at least I can blame blurry shots on the fog today.
The Dabchick seemed to enjoy its Sandeel moustache.
Met Clarko, who'd had two Merlin earlier and 4 Little Egrets - one or two white blobs were visible in the usual spot as I walked around the outside of the Sandplant compound.
Another dead Razorbill in the tide wrack south of the Sandplant - Mike Stocker found one here on Monday, and I think Tropical has noticed a few recently (see earlier comments on "Snapping Chaffinches" blog entry).
This one could well have been the same bird as the one Mike found.
Flock of 35 Linnets in the bushes on the top of the Sandplant escarpment - nice to hear the males starting to sing.
Much of the corrugated buildings have gone from inside the Sandplant compound now - what next for the site??
Earlier in the day I had a Brambling in the garden at Dempsey Towers, and a particularly vicious female Sparrowhawk killing a Jackdaw on the Weld Road roundabout as Mrs D and I headed back home from the weekly shop.
It mantled the corvid as other Jackdaws screamed at it - I guess they never saw it coming.
Eyes to the skies everyone, eyes to the skies....
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Gary wrote...
Hi John there were plenty of Pochard at M/MERE the other day maybe its got too cold for them at Marshside ,that chilly sea breeze at the moment is something else.
Spent last two days trying to get a photo of a pair of Goldcrest in Borsdane woods,Hindley,these things are quicker than a hamster on running wheel and won't keep still.
Just to rub salt in they came into my garden this morning and you guessed it by the time i'd got my camera out they had both gone.
Could do with some tips from Clint Eastwood.
Posted by: Gary | February 4, 2007 12:42 AM