The Russian white-fronted goose influx is showing no signs of abating, with another 40 today at High Rid reservoir near Horwich. I hate round numbers, it makes it seem like you're guessing when actually it was exactly 40 birds. On the other hand, if you say "I saw 6,548 woodpigeons fly over Billinge Hill" you invite a sarcastic comment such as "Are you sure that it wasn't 6,549?". Anyway, I digress, the point is I hate round numbers and believe me, if I could have got it to 41 white-fronts I would have done.
Unfortunately the birds were over the brow of the hill which meant that in order to see them you needed to stand next to the boat club containers which were on the opposite side of the reservoir to the field with the geese. This had some advantages because there was a bitterly cold easterly wind today and the containers offered decent protection, but it meant that the birds were 500m away.
Geese, and especially white-fronts, are amongst my favourite birds, so when this influx started to happen a couple of weeks ago, I set out to make sure that I didn't miss out. I told myself that I wasn't going to be the guy who only saw one Russian white-front in 2026. I feel like I've achieved that goal, especially having found a flock of 30 at Lightshaw the other day, but to put my efforts into perspective, in the past two weeks I've seen a total of 595 Russian white-fronted geese. Two days ago a field near Pilling held a single flock of 670! Oh well, at least I saw 595. Imagine if it had added up to 600.....
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