The Infamous Five met up at Fleetwood this morning hoping to catch more Turnstones, but despite there being the usual couple of hundred about, we waited in vain for any to come in the catching area as most of them stayed roosting on the island of the Marine Lake. The few that came near the net proved reluctant to enter the catching area.
If there is one thing that ringing birds has taught me it is that birds are lot cleverer than we humans perhaps like to admit, and there's many a time when birds outwit our supposed superior intellect. So for the next Turnstone Time we may have to invoke Plan B when we have worked one out.
The Turnstone, as its name suggests, feeds mainly on rocky shorelines, searching for food by probing into cracks and crevices with its short, stubby bill. But here at Fleetwood they learnt many years ago to find food in a very different way. Here they wait for the locals to throw out food onto the grass for gulls and ducks then follow in the larger bird’s footsteps picking up whatever is on offer, often stale bread, fish and chips or the remains of a half-eaten burger.
On the lake were a few Red-breasted Mergansers, with a couple of Pied Wagtails and several Linnets whizzing about. After being turned over by the Turnstones the thought of calling in at Poo Corner to see a Ring-necked Duck didn’t inspire me much so with the sky brightening I journeyed to Out Rawcliffe for a while.
An entertaining couple of hours on the moss realised a few good counts but nothing out of the ordinary, except maybe the 120+ Fieldfare feeding in a wet field with a couple of hundred Starlings. In most years Fieldfares do turn up in early spring, even when they have been absent earlier in the winter as they were this time. Also feeding on the soggy, partly flooded fields were 85 Woodpigeon, 6 Stock Dove, 3 Curlew, 9 Shelduck, 3 Snipe and 180 Lapwing.
Passerines and others: 2 Kestrel, 70+ Chaffinch, 140 Linnet, 14 Yellowhammer and 3 Goldfinch.
As I drove off the moss at 4pm a Sparrowhawk was following the droves of Starlings towards a distant roost. I hope the hawk caught better than we did today.