Dec 31 2014
The tail end of 2013 had seen some great birds (Ross’ Goose, Long-tailed Duck, Two-barred and Common Crossbill, Hoopoe, American Buff-bellied Pipit and Siberian Chiffchaff) but 2014 was not without its great birding days either. We managed twenty life ticks in 2014 and our annual UK list stood at 193 species.
Dec 31 2014
Birding Group Days Out
The first birding group day of December was to Moore Nature Reserve and whilst there was a reasonable smattering of birds, the day was pretty average with one exception, a Tawny Owl – my first ! How strange that, the very next week, at a full day out to WWT Martin Mere we should see another ! Extraordinary, ‘though the second bird was ever better hidden than the first. Nevertheless two Tawny Owls in eight days ! The second Tuesday was also the last birding day of the term so we had our usual post-lunch meeting to knock up a program for the new year.
Dec 30 2014
After reading reports of a Bittern in the reed bed at Budworth Mere for a couple of days, I thought that this could be a great chance to end the birding year (most likely) if I could manage to coincide with this bird. A group of us drove over there and went to the hide overlooking the reed bed getting there around 10 am. No Bittern was to be seen !
Dec 23 2014
To finish off our birding day on the Wirral, after stops at Hoylake for the high tide followed by a visit to New Brighton Marine Lake to see the Purple Sandpipers, we dropped in on Burton Mere Wetlands on the way back. We started off at the reception hide where we got a Black Tailed Godwit and a Spotted Redshank. We walked over to the reedbed hide where we got thee Snipe but, in general, it was far too windy by then for many birds to be around. In fact their bird feeders had suffered quite a bit and were going to need some repairs.
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Dec 23 2014
After a bit of a disappointing spell at Hoylake with a rather birdless high tide at Hoylake, I decided that it was worth a shot popping over to New Brighton to look for Purple Sandpipers. I had read that they were to be found at New Brighton but only recently had I discovered that the place to look was the pontoon on the Marine Lake. We parked up and headed straight for the spot. We immediatley spotted some birds that looked likely but on closer examination they appeared to be Turnstones. Continue reading
Dec 23 2014
A last visit to Hoylake for 2014 was for a high tide of 9.7m at 11.45am. Whilst the tide came in as expected and it came in quite far, for some reason the birds did not appear as expected. There were certainly plenty of Oystercatchers and Curlew and plenty of Gulls but there were only half a dozen Redshanks and the same number of Dunlin ! This was very disappointing and I’m not quite sure why this should be the case. Perhaps too much wind ?
Dec 16 2014
With the birding group dates for the term finished, we had a spare Tuesday so we headed out for Burton Mere Wetlands. It was a low tide around midday so a lot of the possible birds were probably nearer the coast but it still had one or two nice highlights including very prolonged views of a ringtail Hen Harrier hunting over the reeds whilst being bothered by a Carrion Crow.
Dec 09 2014
It is a little hard to believe after seeing a Tawny Owl at Moore the previous week, but on the path down to the Ron Barker hide, just before you reach the Kingfisher Hide and just before a bench we encountered a small group of birders staring up into an ivy-clad tree on the right hand side of the path. After much instructing as to which branch to follow etc, we eventually found, quite high up in the tree a cryptically coloured shape that was incredibly hard to distinguish among the iny; until, that is, it blinked and there we had it – our second Tawny Owl in eight days. This one was ever harder to distinguish from its background unless it moved which it did occasionally. I tried my hardest but I just could not get it in my scope – partly because it was too close !!