New Year's Eve and what has become a traditional visit with Brian to Winter's Pit, East Halton Marsh and Skitter Beck. We picked Brian up at 9.30 and were parked up and scanning the pit by 10.00. We had seen a flock of greylag geese feeding on the fields on the way down the lane but scanning them didn't reveal any pinkfeet or white fronts, although there was a white domestic goose with them. There had been a red-necked grebe on the pit a week or so ago but no sign today just a solitary little grebe. There were plenty of tufted duck, mallard, coot and shoveler. Moving across to look out over the marsh revealed a large flock of wigeon with the occasional teal among them. There was a very good number of lapwing which kept flying up and wheeling around before settling to feed once more. Plenty of curlew were feeding out on the marsh and their bubbling calls periodically echoed across the marsh along with the whisting calls of the wigeon. A beautiful winter scene. Once up on the sea wall we could scan the marsh from above and found a small flock of barnacle geese, unusual and interesting because they mainly winter on the Solway Firth and further north in Scotland. There was not a lot to see as we walked along the sea wall to the Skitter Beck but here we found plenty of redshank, a single dunlin and heron along with some teal along the tideline. Back at the old brick works above the pit we found a flock of avocet that must have flown in in our absence. As far as species seen went, it was an average day with 32. This brought my monthly total up to 55 and my total for the year is 143. Although very gust and chilly it was a splendid morning and time for turkey soup and Christmas cake.
Over the new year period Heather and I have been keeping a record of plants in flower of the new year count by the Botanical Societyy of the British Isles. We have managed 8 species at three sites:
Irby Dales - dandelion, blackthorn, gorse and white dead-nettle.
Scartho Cemetery - hazel, alder, snowdrop, primrose
East Halton Marsh - dandelion and white dead-nettle.
No comments:
Post a Comment