Bright And Breezy

The forecast said bright and breezy and it was spot-on for birding if not for ringing at our exposed sites. I travelled over the moss roads where I hoped for a Barn Owl or two; but no luck this morning, just a pair of Buzzards leaving their overnight roost.

At Gulf Lane the Linnet flock has increased to 200+ birds but no sign of the Stonechat from earlier in the week. With luck we’ll get a crack at catching more Linnets this coming week. Lapwings and Curlews filled the wet fields alongside the A588 with several hundred of each before I even reached Braides Farm.

Here at the farm were 500+ Lapwing and similar numbers of Curlew, and on the flood itself, 80+ Black-tailed Godwit. A mile away I stopped on the rise of Bank End Lane and viewed the fields below. Here were several hundreds more of both Lapwing and Curlew, dozens of Redshank, and once again a large number of Black-tailed Godwit, 130 or more.

The area around Chris the farmer’s midden/slurry pond is holding a good number of insects as well as small birds, mainly pipits and wagtails, but also a few Tree Sparrows and Reed Buntings. After a while the count came to 120 Meadow Pipit, 8 Pied Wagtail, 1 Grey Wagtail, 4 Tree Sparrow, 2 Reed Bunting and a good number of Starlings.

Pied Wagtail

Grey Wagtail

Grey Wagtail

Meadow Pipit

Meadow Pipit

 

Pied Wagtail

Starling

There is a huge southerly migration of Meadow Pipits during August to October, a movement involving birds from Scotland, Scandinavia and Iceland, after which the UK wintering population is quite small. No one is quite sure of the origins of any wintering birds and their numbers can vary enormously according to the severity of the winter. While the weather is mild at the moment whereby there is plenty of insect food, cold and especially frosty weather will see the birds quickly depart south and west.

Meadow Pipit

Conder Pool is pretty much off the boil for now although the cold northerly appeared to have increased the Teal count to 230 together with the first Wigeon (15) for some weeks. Otherwise - approximately 30 each of Lapwing, 30 Redshank and Curlew, 3 Little Grebe, 2 Goosander, 2 Little Egret and 1 Kestrel. Two Ravens flew over heading inland and in a north easterly direction.

There is such a spectacle of noise and activity that it is hard not to drive up Moss Lane where the Whooper Swans have made their winter home. With 450+ Whoopers and a few dozen Mutes there’s enough action to satisfy most observers, the only problem being to isolate a single photo subject  or small group from the multitude packed into the field.

Whooper Swan

 
Just along Slack Lane there was quite a lot of activity around the now redundant set aside field and hedgerow with more Meadow Pipits, Pied Wagtails, Linnets, and even half-a-dozen Greenfinch. It’s not so many years ago that most birders, me included, didn’t bother to record the overly common Greenfinch in their notebooks. Look at it now – a sharp population decline, a now scarce sight and a rare visitor to many a garden.

Greenfinch - BTO

Greenfinch

On the way back up Moss Lane and around Jeremy Lane were hundreds of very mobile Fieldfares. They tried to feed in the roadside hedgerows but fled as each vehicle whooshed by. My estimate of 3/400 is just that. There could have been lots more but they weren’t in the mood for stopping.

Fieldfares

Fieldfare

A successful morning then!  I really should get out more often.

Linking today to World Bird Wednesday.

Saturday’s Schedule

Saturday began dull and cloudy but the forecast was pretty accurate. The sky brightened a little but not enough to get decent photographs. 

I set off in the direction of Cockerham where I stopped in the gateway of Braides Farm and looked on the flood about 300 yards away. The flood is distant but always worth a look with the risk that small birds go missing amongst the puddled, rough grass landscape. I counted 480 Curlew, 10 Black-tailed Godwit and a single Kestrel but I’m sure more bits and pieces were hidden. 

Conder Green proved productive. In the wader stakes I noted 15 Curlew, 15 Redshank, 14 Black-tailed Godwit, 5 Snipe, 4 Lapwing and the single and still wintering Common Sandpiper. The light was far from ideal and required ISO1000, a setting which proved barely enough. 

Redshank

Common Sandpiper

Down on the mud was a single Grey Wagtail and also 4 Meadow Pipits. The incoming tide made it easier to count the Teal now flushed out of their hiding places in the marsh and I counted 170/180. There was a single Grey Heron, 2 Little Egrets, 3 Little Grebe and 9 Goosanders. The latter included 3 stunning looking males, even if they were on the far side of the pool. 

 Meadow Pipit

Little Egret

Teal

I drove around Jeremy Lane and up to Cockersands where I hoped to find and photograph Fieldfares, a species which in some winters appears in large numbers along the hawthorn hedges. But very few Fieldfares today with the best I saw about 50 very mobile birds in two flocks in roadside that flew quickly south and out of sight at the approach of vehicles. I had to make do with a House Sparrow dining on rather old blackberries. 

House Sparrow

Near to Cockersands I found 190 or more Whooper Swans, a number partly hidden as the field dropped down and away from view. As I watched a number of parties flew off noisily towards Cockerham but a hour or so later and when visiting Thursday’s location of almost 500 Whoopers at Cockerham I saw not a one. Clearly this winter’s swans will be very mobile with a selection of places in which to delight their admirers. 

Whooper Swans

Whooper Swans

Whooper Swan

I stopped at Gulf Lane and counted the Linnets at 130+.  Their natural food is still a plentiful mystery where they drop to the bottom of the vegetation, feed on or close to the ground and appear to ignore our line of rape seed.  Six Stock Doves dropped in to feed but they won’t stay around if the ringers or shooters appear and then open their car doors. 

Linnets

 

More birds soon. It’s Saturday evening and I’m due a glass of plonk.

In the meantime, linking to Stewart's World Bird Wednesday and  Anni's Blog.

Linnets And Swan Lake

It had been more than six weeks ago on 23rd September that we managed a ringing session at Linnet Project 2017/18. Six weeks of wind and rain which limited our visits to spot count days only with not a single visit for ringing purposes during October. At this site we need a dry morning and ideally, a wind of 5mph or less. 

At last the forecast was tolerable for this morning so I met Andy at 0715 and we set a couple of single panels through what is left of the wildflower/bird seed field after its autumn battering.  At the moment the finch flock is Linnets only and numbers about 130 at any one time so we were not too disappointed with a catch of 14 Linnets - two adult males, and the remaining 12 made up of 7 first year males and 5 first year females. This bumped up the Linnet ringing total here to 177 during the autumn of 2017. 

Linnet - male

Linnet - female

Linnet

During July to September the post-breeding finch flock here numbered up to 250 birds, 50% of which were Goldfinch targeting a large crop of sow thistle. The sow thistle has now gone and so have the Goldfinch. It was during this period that we ringed nine Goldfinches. One of these Goldfinches, S800188 ringed here on 26th August was found dead 40 kms away in Darwen, Blackburn on 29th October. The Goldfinch had collided with a glass window and picked up dead by the householder. Collisions with glass account for a large number of small bird deaths. 

Highlight of the morning’s birding was the many thousands of Pink-footed Geese leaving their salt marsh roost just hundreds of yards away and over the nearby sea bund. We made no attempt to count the often very distant geese but they were in tens of thousands. We also noted good numbers of Whooper Swans flying overhead and later spoke to a wildfowler who said that other shooters had reported approximately 700 Whoopers in recent days. 

After our ringing I drove around to where the swans had dropped, a corn field left unharvested after it flooded badly during recent rains, a field which now resembles a shallow lake. It was here I counted 470 Whooper Swans, 15 to 20 Mute Swans together with many hundreds of large gulls, Starlings and Jackdaws. There is another herd of swans along at Sand Villa and Braides Farm so the shooters’ count of 700 swans is more than feasible. 

Swan Lake - Cockerham

Whooper Swans

 

Whooper Swans

In the same area as the swans were 15+ Skylark, similar numbers of Tree Sparrows and a single Grey Wagtail. 

Starlings

 

Tree Sparrow

Stay on board. There's more birding, ringing and photos to come soon on Another Bird Blog.

Linking today to Eileen's Blog.

Friday's Fields

The Pink-footed Geese - “pinks”, “pinkies” or simply “geese” to us locals are in huge numbers this week, perhaps up to 20,000. I think there's been an influx from South Lancashire and Norfolk with many beginning their leisurely journey back to Iceland via Scotland in time for the breeding season. They will not be the first on territory though as following a whole series of mild winters, some say global warming, many pinkies now spend the winter in Iceland and so save themselves the danger and energy requirements of a 2,000 mile round trip to the UK. 

Usually the geese stick to the flat-as-a-pancake fields of Cockerham/Pilling/Stalmine area and don’t often venture even the few miles north to the pastures of Thurham. Here Lower Thurnham stays at sea level but Higher Thurnham can rise to the dizzy height of 50 metres above.

"Click the pics" for a chance to count the silent pinkies. Sorry there's no soundtrack.

Looking down from the A588 onto the partly flooded fields gave a new perspective to the challenge of counting geese when each and every field held hundreds, sometimes thousands of our pink-footed friends. And then towards the coast just half-a-mile away were something like 500 wild swans, a mix of Whooper Swans and ten or twelve Bewick’s Swan. 

Pink-footed Geese at Thurham

Pink-footed Geese

"Pinkies" at Thurnham

Pink-footed Geese

Pink-footed Goose

 Wild swans at Thurnham

Whooper Swans

Geese at Higher Thurnham

Down to Cockersands the fields swarmed with both Lapwings and Golden Plovers, impossible to count with accuracy but certainly numbering in the early thousands of each. 

There was nothing much doing at the caravan site except for a number of Greenfinch, Goldfinch and Tree Sparrow although a Chiffchaff at the entrance gate was a pleasant surprise. 

Greenfinch

Conder Green proved quiet birding with a reduction to 95 Teal, 18 Redshank, 2 Little Grebe,2 Wigeon 1 Little Egret and 1 Spotted Redshank. Noticeable were the three pairs of Oystercatchers and now clearly on territory in three distinct locations across the pool and islands. 

I travelled back via Gulf Lane where there are still 170 wintering Linnet. Also here - 8 Stock Dove ,1 Little Egret, 1 Kestrel and 1 Reed Bunting. 

I drove back home via Pilling/Rawcliffe and Stalmine mosses where I saw 4 Buzzards and then 2 Kestrels and also caught up with 20 or so Corn Buntings in the usual spot. Maybe it’s not just geese on the move as I found 3 separate flocks of Fieldfares totalling 425 individuals but managed to see just a single Redwing. At one tiny flood were 8 Pied Wagtails. 

Fieldfare

The weekend weather forecast looks dire to say the least but with luck I will be out there birding. Stay tuned to see what turns up on Another Bird Blog.

Linking today to Anni's Birding and Eileen's Saturday.

Saturday Sun

The morning didn’t look too with heavy cloud, spots of rain and a northerly breeze. Luckily I’d spoken to Andy on Friday night to cancel plans to catch Linnets. 

Then suddenly about 0915 the sky cleared to leave a bright blue sky. Later than normal I set off birding, new camera at the ready. 

At Gulf Lane I counted 150+ Linnets in the set-aside as well as 11 Stock Dove. Looks like the doves have found the seed mix but when I took a closer look there seemed to be lots on the ground so I’m still not sure if the Linnets are taking much. Holes and pathways through the crop suggest that voles, moles and rats may be having a beano during the hours of darkness. There was a Kestrel hanging around and at one point it dived into the grass as if to grab a bite to eat but came away with nothing. 

Kestrel

At Gulf Lane/Braides/Sand Villa birds pushed from the rising tide and into the inland fields were very distant with best estimates of 1000 Lapwing, 600 Pink-footed Goose, 500+ Golden Plover,250 Curlew, 150 Redshank, 60 Wigeon, 25 Teal, 8 Whooper Swan, 4 Shoveler and 2 Shelduck. 

I decided to take drive down towards Cockersands but stopped first on Moss Lane where a small herd of mixed swans fed, 10 Mute, 12 Whooper and 8 Bewick’s. There have been 400/500 Whooper Swans in the extensive fields around here, almost a full day’s work to locate and count them all. Even then the counts come with a health warning because of the swans’ constant mobility. 

Whooper Swan

At Cockersands I stopped to watch a flock of about 80 Twite feeding quietly in and out of the marsh grass and tide wrack. It proved to be a good move as an hour or more later I was still there after a series of birds appeared. 

First came a Barn Owl which suddenly appeared from over the caravan site and where at the back are tumbledown farm buildings ideal for a winter roost. Like the Kestrel before, the owl dropped into the grass, did a quick about turn and disappeared from whence it came. There was just time for a few snatched shots. 

Barn Owl

Barn Owl

It wasn’t just Twite feeding in the marsh, also 10+ Greenfinch, 3 Reed Bunting, 6 Linnet, a couple of Blackbirds, several House Sparrows, 2 Collared Dove and dozens of Starlings. In the paddock: 3 Fieldfare, 1 Redwing, 1 Song Thrush, 4 Goldfinch, 6 Tree Sparrows and more Blackbirds.

Twite

Linnet

 

Greenfinch

Blackbird

Starling

Robin

Collared Dove 

What of the new camera? Well a little sun makes all the difference for sure. I have to work on the intial exposure setting as well as getting used to a different set of buttons and changed menu, but so far so good. With 24 megapixels the crop factor is pretty good, ideal for those long range pictures that birds often demand.

Linking today to World Bird Wednesday and Anni's Birding.