Hoylake, Wallasey Beach, New Brighton, Denhall Quay 3rd February 2022

We took the opportunity of going to Hoylake for a high tide of 10 metres at 12:30pm. It was a rare wind-free day and so it turned out to be very pleasant and the day was made all the better by views from a few feet of a Snow Bunting feeding on the ground just outside the lifeboat station. But that bird was not the only Snow Buntings of the day.

We started out at Meols where the tide wasn’t quite in yet and we got very close views of all the usual waders, though only the Redshanks and Oystercatchers were in big numbers. We followed the tide until we got to Hoylake lifeboat station where we say some people taking photos on the grassy, sandy patch just outside the lifeboat station. Here a single SNow Bunting was feeding happily and not too bothered by the collection of people who did maintain a decent distance. It later flew off onto the rocks nearby where it gave the collected photographers an even better opportunity of a colourful bird against a sunny blue background.

There were a lot of dog walkers and these didn’t do any favours for the birds or the birders and, thinking we had seen pretty much all we were going to see, we headed of for a new site for us – Wallasey Beach. A couple of people in our birding group had suggested that this would be a good place to look for Snow Buntings so, with the pressure off now we headed there to see if we could add to our tally of one.

We found the site easily enough. We took our usual route to New Brighton but just before we reached the promenade we turned left along Bayview Drive until we reached the “Derby Pool” Harvester pub/restaurant. We parked in the public car park and we took a right turn onto the coastal path. There was a small patch of dunes before the sea which was well in by this time. On the other side of the road were more dunes. We didn’t hold out much hope of finding any Snow Buntings because the place was rammed with dog walkers. However, I looked up and sw a flurry of birds that had Pied Wagtails in but also some other birds that looked promising. I followed them in flight until they landed on the dunes on the landward side of the path and it was moments before aon or two took to perching on the fence giving good views. We walked bak along the path and got great views of four Snow Buntings among the dunes. We wathced until the call of a bacon sandwich and a cup of tea at New Brighton was too great.

At New Brighton it was still a nice day and not windy at all, so we sat outside the cafe on the pontoon side so I could scope the pontoon whilst sitting having a cup of tea! I immediately got a numbe of Purple Sandpipers – at least eight. There were also lots of Redshanks and Turnstones and smaller numbers of Dunlin. After our tea and bacon sandwich, I walked around the outside of the marine lake a bit to get a different view and as I was watching the birds all rose as one and shot off. I looked up just in time to see a Peregraine flying off over the roof of the building. I don’t think it managed to catch anything. With the pontoon now empty we headed off to Denhall Quay so see if we could get any Owls or birds of prey there.

As it happens, we were out of lucka at Denhall Quay and the wind was gettting up. Again the place was full of photographers and two had even set up camp in the marsh with their cameras on tripods and they were in camo hunkered down. We waited a while and had a drink and a chat to some other birders but then decided to call it a day. Two seperate sightings of Snow Buntings turned out to be the best birds of the day.

Bird Sightings : Hoylake 3rd February 2022

Bird Sightings : Wallasey Beach 3rd February 2022

Bird Sightings : New Brighton Marine Lake 3rd February 2022

Bird Sightings : Denhall Quay, Little Neston 3rd February 2022