Preparations for our now imminent departure to Aus combined with a desire on my part to work as many hours as possible before we go have been somewhat all-consuming in recent weeks and have prevented me from doing much birding. However news of a possible grey-bellied Brant on Banks Marsh just north of Southport peeked my interest and with an unexpected free day today I decided to go and have a look. Grey-bellied brant is a bit of an enigma, nobody really knows what it is or how to identify it, and even less people have actually seen one. Actually, that doesn't include me, I have seen grey-bellied brant before and it's already on my UK list having seen one at Dundrum, Northern Ireland about five years ago. For what it's worth, this blog post contains a few of my thoughts on the Banks Marsh bird.
I parked at Hesketh Out Marsh and walked west towards Old Hollow Farm until I came to the west gate at HOM. From here I could see the goose flock, but they were very distant, perhaps a mile away on the marsh. However a quick look through the scope almost immediately revealed a brent goose, very black and white looking in amongst the pinkies, with gleaming white flanks. It was too far away to have any hope of assigning it to race, but surely that was it, I wasn't aware of any other reported brents in the area. Encouraged by this instant result I continued along the sea wall for another mile or so until I was beginning to think that I'd have been better off parking at Old Hollow Farm. The geese were still quite distant, about half a mile away I would estimate, and in the sunny periods there was an annoying heat haze, but this was about as good as it was going to get so I sat myself down and remained here watching the flock for about the next three hours. In that time, the bird showed better than the photos here would suggest and at times was quite a reasonable scope view.
I've put together the following notes, as ever these are just my ramblings based on very limited field experience and not intended to be the final word on brent or brant identification.
Over the past few years since around the time I saw the Northern Ireland bird I've put in many hours studying photos and researching the brents and especially grey-bellied brant. To my mind, grey-bellied brant is more akin to pale-bellied brent, unlike black brant which fits better alongside dark-bellied brent. Pale-bellied and grey-bellied have a brownish hue to their backs and lower breast whereas black brant and dark-bellied have a black or dark grey hue.
In the latter species pair, the black / dark grey on the head, neck and upper breast extends onto the lower breast and belly with little or no contrast and continues between the legs and a fair way beyond towards the tail. In the field the bird currently at Banks shows a distinct brownish hue and a decent contrast between the neck / upper breast and the back / lower breast.
Crucially, the dark areas on it's breast extend down towards the legs but stop in an almost straight line between the legs. This fits pale-bellied / grey-bellied rather than black brant / dark-bellied. Whatever this bird may be, it's certainly not a black brant or dark-bellied brent or any hybrid combination of those two races in my opinion.
What I can't rule out, because I don't have enough experience with them, is a pale-bellied x dark-bellied hybrid, which is probably the pairing which would produce the closest fit to grey-bellied. If this is the offspring of such a pairing then it seems to have inherited more of the pale-bellied genes. The extent and shape of the dark belly between the legs does not fit dark-bellied, and the brown hue is more consistent with pale-bellied / grey bellied. Personally I think that this is a good contender for grey-bellied brant, but I'm still not sure how we could categorically rule out this hybrid pairing. Certainly not on the views I had of the bird.
There has been a probable grey-bellied brant with the pink-footed geese in Norfolk this winter and the pinks do move back and forth between Lancashire and Norfolk. Having looked at the photos from Norfolk it looks likely to be the same bird to me. In Norfolk the bird apparently showed much better and perhaps enough was seen on it to get it accepted and onto the British list. That being the case, the Banks Marsh bird only has to be considered the same bird in order to become the first accepted British record of grey-bellied brant. It's got to be worth a look while it's still in the area.
One of the highlights of the day were the numbers of white wagtails on the marsh. In one quick scan I counted 98.
There was a flock of about 35 avocets at Hesketh Out Marsh.
Eiders breed on the Ribble, but I'm pretty sure that this is a first for Hesketh Out Marsh for me.
I was pleased to come across two oil beetles on my walk back to the car. I think that this is violet oil beetle.
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