An Excellent Morning at Winter's and the Humber Marshes

Although slightly hazier today, the sun did put in an appearance and the weather turned very warm. When Brian and I arrived at Winter's Pit, that and the adjacent marshes had lost that winter atmosphere. Song birds were giving voice, there were far fewer birds on the old brick pit and fewer flocks of wildfowl and waders were flying around. Interestingly the small flock of barnacle geese was still present.

We made our way around the pit, noting again the surprising lack of great crested grebes, although there were quite a few little grebes present. A marsh harrier periodically cruised over putting up the wigeon and curlews that were present on the marsh. When we climbed up onto the sea wall overlooking the Humber the tide was fully in with no mud for feeding waders and ducks. As we made our way along the bank towards the outfall of the Skitter Beck we noticed far more birds singing and making their presence known; spring is here. We heard a chiffchaff and skylarks were singing constantly. Several Cetti's warrblers were present evidenced by their very loud explosive calls. Good to hear; we hadn't heard them during the winter despite them being resident.

When we reached the Skitter there was some exposed mud and while we enjoyed our tomato soup and Christmas cake we were able to watch dunlin, redshank, little egret and shelduck. A few meadow pipits joined the skylarks; I love to see them fly up and then parachute down singing as they descend. On our walk we had seen my first coltsfoot and lesser celendines in flower.

We were well pleased with our 41 species and revelled in the warm spring weather.

Barnacle Geese.

Coltsfoot

Herring Gulls.

An Early Start on the Freshney and the First Summer Migrants.

 It was a beautiful morning when I parked at St Michael's Church on the outskirts of Grimsby by the River Freshney. Jet was keen to be off on his walk and we crossed the main road onto the banks of the Fresney. We quickly lost the sound of the traffic and the only noise was that of bird song. We are very lucky to have the Freshney on our doorstep as it is one of the UK's rare chalk streams with crystal clear water, water voles, kingfisher and, although I have yet to see one, otter. It rises on the springline of the rolling hills of the Lincolnshire Wolds at Welbeck Springs by Welbeck Hill at the south west of the map sheet. It flows at first north east and then quickly to the north, flowing through the edge of the village of Laceby as the Laceby Beck. It then flows north east again, becoming the River Freshney as it enters the outskirts of Grimsby, passes under the main road at Little Coates, finally turning south east to flow through the West Marsh area of town before entering the Humber Estuary via Grimsby dock. Chalk streams are a priority habitat for conservation and enhancement in both the UK and the Lincolnshire Biodiversity Action Plans.

As Jet and I made our way along the river it wasn't long before I heard my first chiffchaff, largely a summer migrant to our shores after overwintering in Africa. During the walk I heard and saw five in total; definite signs of spring. Another harbinger of spring and summer was the comma butterfly  found later during our walk. Butterflies have been slow to get going locally and this was only my second of the year. A friend who puts out a moth trap has only had a single Hebrew Character moth in his trap so far this year.

I was pleased to hear the repeated phrases of a song thrush's song and the churring of wrens. Cetti's warblers were also calling loudly. These plain brown songsters are here all the year round but have only just started singing with the onset of the warmer weather.

Town's Holt is an area of reed bed and lagoons adjacent to the beck and forms part of Freshney Bog which was constructed in 2001 as a washland, which could be used to hold excess water when the channel below it could not cope with the flow in the river. It is a major part of the flood defence system for Grimsby. The flooding of the area killed the trees that once grew there and the dead skeltons rise above the reeds and are ideal perches for cormorants and gulls. As I walked along the bank of the Freshney next to the Holt I was able to photograph a heron waiting, statue-like, for prey to pass by and also cormorants on the dead trees. Zooming into the cormorant photo shows the bird's brilliant blue eye to perfection. I had a brief glimpse of a kingfisher here as it zipped across the lagoon.

Eventually I left the houses of Laceby Acres behind and walked out onto open fields and immediatley could hear skylarks singing - magical. On the way back to the car I heard a great spotted woodpecker drumming, a buzzard drifted over and I heard a little grebe 'laughing' from the reed bed. It had been a perfect morning and in all I saw 31 bird species, one butterfly, busy buff-tailed bumble bees and my first cherry plum blossom.

Cherry plum

Cherry plum

Cherry plum

Chiffchaff

Chiffchaff

Chiffchaff

Comma

Cormorant

Cormorant

Cormorant

Dunnock

Rare English Elm in the Freshney Valley

Rare English Elm in the Freshney Valley

Heron

Heron

Reed Bunting

Robin

A Good Morning on the Local Patch

 Another beautiful day today; 9C and feeling warm in the sun with a gentle SW breeze. I set out fairly early (for me nowadays!!!) for a walk around the cemetery, woodland burial ground and a circuit of the Horsefield (Gooseman's Field). I was pleased to see and hear jackdaw and housesparrow as I walked down the busy main road towards the cemetery. House sparrow was particularly pleasing as they are musch less common nowadays and we never get them in our garden even though these ones were only a couple of hundred yards from home.

As soon as I turned down the access road to the cemetery, the traffic noise vanished and all was calm. Once in the cemetery I followed the perimeter route around the older parts of the burial ground. Bird song was all around, mainly robins which is often the case. There must be a huge population of robins; I am rarely out of earshot of one. I also heard/saw blue and great tit, goldfinch, greenfinch, blackbird, wren, chaffinch and long-tailed tit. More primroses and daffodils appear each day whilst snowdrops are beginning to go over now; they are finished completely in the garden. As 'The Historian' would say, "Well that's another year gone!".

Halfway around the woodland burial ground I squeezed through the fence and crossed over the ditch into the Horsefield. Actually it's not so much of a squeeze now as another fence rail has been removed. Although I don't really approve of this practice, I have to say that there used to be access out of the woodland burial ground onto the common land of the Horsefield but the council, in their wisdom (or lack of) padlocked the gate. What do they expect!!!

Once across the ditch I could hear the linnets immediatley and found them all around Gooseman's They stick together in small companies and always sound as if they are in the middle of heated debate. They are also incredibly flighty and very difficult to get close to for photography. As I made my circuit of the fields I was hoping for early butterflies but non were to be found. A naturalist friend who also calls this area his local patch agrees with me that things are slow on the butterfly and moth front so far this year. A neighbour and good friend of ours (Gothic Dave), who is interested and knowledgable in all manner of subjects, helps with harvest mouse surveys and tells me that they found four nests on Gooseman't field; wonderful news. In the south west corner of the site I found four stonechats; I had been looking for them for ages.

Back in the woodland burial ground I disturbed a sparrowhawk which hurtled out onto the fields. When I arrived at the alder copse in the main cemetery I was photographing the catkins when I noticed that a newly planted tree was also producing catkins. The plant label identified it as an Alnus glutinosa, a black alder. According to google it is the same species as common alder but the young catkins look different; perhaps they will turn out to be the same. I shall enjoy watching it grow over the years.

Alder catkins

Linnets

Linnets

Linnet

Magpie

Skylark

Stonechat

Stonechat

Stonechat

Whisby Wanderings

 A trip to Whisby Nature Reserve near Lincoln today. The original purpose of the visit was to try to see the starling murmuration but having spoken to the warden who told me that it had never really got going this winter, we dcided to go earlier for a general explore. In the event we spent most of the day there anyway. We began with a walk around Grebe Lake, returning to the visitor center and cafe for some lunch. For the afternoon excursion we crossed the railway to the northern end of the reserve and visited the large Willow Lake.

Close to the reserve center is Thorpe Lake from which came a cacophany of noise: it is a black-headed gull nesting colony. There were other species around, though, and I was pleased to see and photograph both goldeneye and a great crested grebe which gave spectacular views. There were good numbers of tufted duck on Grebe Lake and I was pleased to see pochard. On the far side of the lake I came across two roe deer; beautiful.

Despite getting slightly lost in the afternoon, we eventually reached the expansive Willow Lake. Although largly distant, there were good numbers of birds, in particular great crested grebes paired up and busily displaying.

On the way back to the car we sat on a bench overlooking Grebe Lake for a rest. Scanning the lake I spotted an oystercatcher and whilst I was watching it a kingfisher flashed across my view; wonderful. Even better it sped back across the lake and perched in a hawthorn hedge. A fitting end to a good visit.

The day was not yet over, however, as we went into Lincoln for a wander around the top of Steep Hill. The light was superb and the cathedral looked amazing. We went for an Italian at our favoured restaurant: Gino's. and before setting out for home I went and took some twilight images of the catherdral.

 

Tufted Duck

Tufted Duck

Silver Birch

Silver Birch

Robin

Goat Willow

Kestrel

Kestrel

Kestrel

Grebe Lake

Great crested grebe

Great crested grebe

Great crested grebe

Gorse

Gorse

Goldeneye