February 2013 archive

Feb 28 2013

Summary February 2013

Summary February 2013

Garden

February continued wet and sometimes very windy and still a bit cold. Many of our garden birds seem to be absent though I did see a Wren on several occasions. By the 13th there was more snow and the cold brought our two Mistle Thrushes back into the garden. In fact I hear them quite often even if I cannot always see where they are. Dunnocks are re-appearing. By the last week of the month the sun had gone and the cold returned with the odd flurry of snow. Lots of the Starlings have disappeared and there are only a few Goldfinch around.

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Feb 26 2013

Birding Group Visit to Brockholes Nature Reserve 26th February 2013

Birding Group Visit to Brockholes Nature Reserve 26th February 2013

The last birding group outing for the month was to a new venue for us, Brockholes Nature Reserve which turned out to be a much larger site than we had imagined on the many occasions we had passed over it on the motorway. They have great facilities and there are several routes you can take around the site. We parked up at the car park – which charges £4 for five hours – and walked down to the swish visitor centre / cafe / shop complex. Our first treat was to four Meadow Pipits feeding on the small hillock to our left.

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Feb 19 2013

Birding Group Visit to Pennington Flash 19th February 2013

Birding Group Visit to Pennington Flash 19th February 2013

Our latest visit to Pennington Flash was unusually clement with hardly any wind and, although it was quite cold, there were plenty of birds around and it was a great day for birding. We started off in the car park and from here we saw Canada Geese, Coots, Moorhen, Mallards, Tufted Ducks, Goldeneye and Goosander and the usual range of Gulls on the Flash. In a surrounding trees there were a pair of Bullfinches and on the ground we saw a Song Thrush and a Pied Wagtail.

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Feb 17 2013

Day Out To Etherow Country Park 17th February 2013

Day Out To Etherow Country Park 17th February 2013

We started out by walking up the path between the two lakes where there were the usual Canada Geese and Mallards were present with a smattering of domestic geese. On the right there were lots of Black-headed Gulls on the sailing pond. Unusually this far down there were a half a dozen Mandarin Ducks which were looking particularly fine on a lovely sunny day. A little further up we noted two Greylag amongst the Canada Geese.

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Feb 12 2013

Birding Group Visit to Point of Ayr 12th February 2013

Birding Group Visit to Point of Ayr 12th February 2013

We planned this visit to coincide with a high tide (10 metres) and we thought that if we arrived at the viewing site by an hour bebore this we would be well in position to observe the tide come in. Unfortunately , even before we got to the new hide, it was clear that the tide was already a long way in. If I had read my notes for our previous visit there I would have noticed that you need to be there two hours before ! Oh well, I wasn’t the only one who thought an hour before would be good enough so we all learned a lesson. Be that as it may, it did not mean that we did not get some good sightings.

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Feb 05 2013

Birding Group Day Out to RSPB Marshside and Mere Sands Woods 5th February 2013

Birding Group Day Out to RSPB Marshside and Mere Sands Woods 5th February 2013

Last week we deferred our visit to Marshide due to bad weather though surely it couldn’t have been much worse than we had this week with phenomenally strong winds and later on driving rain. It was all a bit severe but it was not without its rewards as we got some very good views of some nice birds.

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Feb 02 2013

Visit to Wirral Country Park for Warden-led Walk 2nd February 2013

Visit to Wirral Country Park for RSPB Walk 2nd February 2013

I had seen references to Thurstaston and Wirral Country Park on birding web sites and it was said to be good for wintering birds. I looked up a web site for the country park and I discovered a warden led walk there at the time of high tide. This sounded perfect so we headed off for this. We often drive past the entrance to the country park when we are visiting birding sites on the Wirral. In fact the entrance is off the same roundabout that we often stop off at for lunch at the Cottage Loaf pub. The day was very pleasant and looked good for a nice walk along the beach.

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Feb 01 2013

Walk on Chorlton Ees and Chorlton Water Park 1st February 2013

Walk on Chorlton Ees and Chorlton Water Park 1st February 2013

I had read on a birders message board that someone had seen Fieldfare and Snipe on the rough ground next to the football pitch at Chorlton Ees so we set off for a morning walk over there. We walked the short route which took us by the old sewage works which is a way we do not normally go preferring the longer walk down the side of Chorlton Brook. We were very glad we did because the first thing we came across was a small flock of half a dozen Lesser Redpolls ! These had not been our target birds but you do read that they are around the Ees and Kenworthy Woods so I suppose it should have been less surprising than it was.

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