Birding Group Visit to Goyt Valley 4th June 2013

Birding Group Visit to Goyt Valley 4th June 2013

The birding group visit to Goyt Valley was always going to be interesting because last year we decided that we had probably left it too late to go there. This year it was decided to go a couple of weeks earlier but, of course, this year spring is so late in coming that we might even have been too early. This throws up the difficulty of planning so far ahead but it is hard to know what can be done to try to schedule our trips more flexibly. Anyway, as it turned out it was quite similar in the lack of birds to last year. The notable exception to this was very good views of Redstarts !We parked up at the second car park down near the bottom of the reservoir and at the waters edge we saw a single Common Sandpiper. Elsewhere on the reservoir there were a few roosting Mallards and a Cormorant drying itself in the sun. In the strip of woodland leading down to the river, the first birds we saw were Treecreepers and then in the middle of the road quite a way ahead we could see a small brownish bird with a very upright posture. As we watched it eventually flew off revealing a large patch of red on its rump. This was just to be the first of our Redstarts for the day but we still had to be patient. During the morning a few people did manage to get brief views of Pied Flycatcher but I dipped out on that one. As we walked down to the river bed we hoped we would see a Dipper but, again, no luck.

We took the steep path back up to the road and then walked to the juncture where the path leads uphill so that you look down on the main road. This proved to be more fruitful and we got views of a couple of pairs of Redstarts sunbathing on the somewhat collapsed drystone wall that runs along the edge of the path. At one point, I stopped and there was a beautiful male Redstart perched on a branch only a few feet away from me with nothing to obscure the view. It sat there for a couple of minutes giving us great views.

As we got to the end of the path we saw a Kestrel hunting over the trees in the distance. As we descended down to the car park I heard a Curlew calling and as we reached the road level we could see this bird flying across the reservoir. There were also three Buzzards flying quite low and giving great views.

As we were about to leave, a couple of our group said they had just seen a female Pied Flycatcher feeding a fledgling and had also heard a Spotted Flycatcher. Needless to say we went back up there but it wasn’t to be for us. As the others left for home we headed off to the Cat and Fiddle on top of the moor. As we drove there we saw a Curlew perched on a roadside post entirely untroubled by our car – we got to within a few feet before it flew off. At the Cat and Fiddle we got a last tick for the day – a Red Grouse on the top of the moor !

Bird Sightings : Goyt Valley