Attempted breeding of Avocets at Lightshaw Flash, Greater Manchester

On the morning of 17th April 2021, a pair of avocets appeared at Lightshaw Flash, having been seen at nearby Bickershaw Rucks the previous evening. Following a prolonged period of dry weather, water levels at Lightshaw were as low as I have ever seen them for the time of year, with a lot of exposed mud and on the first day of their arrival I commented to a friend that it looked good as a potential breeding site, though at this point there was no expectation that they would stay more than a day or two. After all, avocets had only once previously bred in Greater Manchester, at Rumworth Lodge near Bolton in 2011 so there was no reason to believe that they would breed again in the county this year. I put out the news of the birds presence on social media and the Manchester Bird Forum and the birds were reported again by another observer later that evening.

My next visit to Lightshaw was on 19th April when there was no sign of any avocets and I just assumed that they had been passing through and that was the last we would see of them. To my surprise however, two days later on the 21st, the pair were back. Now I was a bit more cautious. I contacted the county recorder and asked his advice regarding publicising these birds. At this stage though there was still no suggestion that they would breed and we agreed that unless I saw specific breeding behaviour, there was no need to suppress the presence of the birds. Thirty minutes later I'd seen them mating and preparing a scrape! A news blackout from Lightshaw now ensued.

Dotterel on the Great Orme

The Great Orme is my favourite place in the World and Llandudno is the place I would most like to live, more than any other place that I have ever been to. I do recognise that in achieving it's lofty status, the Orme has probably been helped by a big dose of nostalgia, memories of days gone by, right from my earliest childhood. 

I've seen lots of great birds here, but in nearly 50 years birding I have always wanted to see Dotterel on the Great Orme, but they've always eluded me for various reasons, until today. Two females were on the Orme yesterday but the weather was shocking, with strong winds and battering hailstone. I decided to risk it and leave it until today when there was a much better forecast. After all, when you're hoping to finally find the Holy Grail, it would be better to find it on a beautiful day.  

I got lucky, the birds decided to stay another day and showed really well, down to 3m at times. In the warm(ish) sunshine I was able to sit and watch them in comfort for a couple of hours. Not that any of my close up camera shots were any good, all of the close up photos in this post were taken on my phone through the scope, only the more distant photos were through the camera.

 

Bonaparte's gull, Upton Warren

Upton Warren is a place I've been aware of since 1983 when Bill Oddie mentioned it as his local patch in his "Little Black Bird Book", yet remarkably perhaps despite birding all over the country during the following nearly 40 years, this was my first ever visit to the place.

I was working just seven miles away and virtually had to drive past it on my way to the motorway so when news broke that there was a 1st winter Bonaparte's gull on the reserve it seemed too good an opportunity to miss.  Thankfully the bird showed immediately and well as it hawked around the lake very like a little gull. This was my 8th Bonaparte's gull in the UK and my 6th in the past eight years, but only my second 1st winter bird. My first ever encounter with the species was a 1st winter bird in Cardiff almost 25 years ago to the day.

South Cumbrian coast

A fairly quiet day on the south Cumbrian coast today, five wheatears spent the day on the rocks just below me, a couple of skeins of pink-footed geese went over, a handful of Sandwich terns fished the channel and the highlight, five whimbrel were on the mudflats.

Perhaps most interesting to me though were the dog-violet species on the bank next to my perch. I'm pretty sure that most of them were heath dog-violet especially because of the yellow / pale green spurs.

Avocets, Lightshaw Flash

Two avocets at Lightshaw this morning were both a year tick and a site tick for me. They're probably the same birds which were at Bickershaw yesterday evening. Also today at least three black-tailed godwits and two redshank. Yesterday there were still two wigeon and a couple of little ringed plover.

Under the cliffs of the Great Orme

The seabird colonies on the Great Orme are not as awe inspiring as many other places around the coast of the UK, but they are still impressive non-the-less. Today I sat myself down in my favourite quiet place on the edge of a cliff and spent an hour or so immersing myself in the sights and sounds of this wonderful place. 

There's plenty of activity at the moment. Most obvious are the kittiwakes, they are scattered across the water and their calls fill the air, one of the most beautiful of all of the gulls. Guillemots and razorbills fly to and from the cliffs with whirring wings, while fulmars are quite the opposite and glide past without a flap. Out at sea gannets are passing by now and I find their plunge diving as impressive today as it was when I saw my first in Gairloch Bay in Wester Ross, way back in the early 1980s.

White-winged scoter, Fisherrow, Musselburgh

Photo: American white-winged scoter (left)
with velvet scoter, Fisherrow, Musselburgh.

Wow what a bird! My photos may not show it but the American white-winged scoter at Musselburgh is just magnificent. On my way home from working in Scotland today I called in at Fisherrow harbour near Musselburgh for my fourth attempt to see this bird since it turned up here almost exactly three years ago. Just four days before the first covid lockdown in March last year I was here and convinced myself that I had seen it but on reviewing the sighting recently I decided to remove it from my list because there was too much doubt in my mind.

 

Unfortunately the bird has been very hit and miss this winter, it's been seen for a day or two but then gone missing for a week. However it had been seen two days ago and though it subsequently wasn't reported yesterday when the weather was pretty awful, I decided that it had to be worth a look today with a much improved forecast and seeing as I was in the area anyway. One of the problems when hoping to see a long staying rarity is that you can never be sure how many people are still looking for it or if every sighting is being reported, and often these birds just seem to fade away with less and less reports. 

I started off at at Joppa just west of Musselburgh because that's where the bird had last been seen and where it seems to have been reported most often this winter. However I soon gave up here because most of the velvet scoter were away to my right and were slightly against the light on this bright sunny day, so I decided that Fisherrow would be a better bet.

I walked out to the mouth of the harbour at Fisherrow and started to scan from there. It was bitterly cold in the brisk northerly wind which also made the scope shake quite a bit, but at least the light was perfect. 

I've said before that for a west coast inland birder who is used to seeing velvet scoter either in grotty  1st winter plumage on a local reservoir or as dots miles away out to sea off the North Wales coast it's just a joy to see them so close at Musselburgh, where you can easily see the males yellow bills and the white patch behind the eye. Of course views like this are pretty vital when trying to see an American white-winged scoter for which the subtleties of bill shape and colour are key to the identification.

I was alone and at first it was like looking for a needle in a haystack, there were small groups of scoter scattered across the sea and many of them too far out for me to have any chance of picking out the star bird. Fortunately one group of about 30 velvets was a good bit closer than the rest and I decided to trust to luck and concentrate on these. Even now it wasn't easy, my hands were like blocks of ice, the wind was shaking the scope and the birds kept disappearing for periods in the swell or frustratingly kept diving before I could get a good look at them. Miraculously I spotted it straight away, a brute of a scoter, large headed and bull necked with a large white tick behind the eye, surely that was the bird, but then it was gone, all of the flock had dived. A minute later they popped up a little to the right but then dived again before I could get a good look at any. I wasn't completely convinced at this stage but I'd seen enough to make me forget the more distant birds and concentrate on this flock. 

Spotted Sandpiper, Croy

The long staying spotted sandpiper at Croy Shore in Ayrshire is now really living up to it's name. When this bird first appeared here last autumn it was a spotless 1st winter bird, but now it looks very like an adult which is presumably what it will be when it completes its moult. 

  

It's such a wonderfully confiding bird and I'm so lucky to be working close by giving me the opportunity to see it. If you just sit and wait it will walk right past you within just a metre or two.

There's obviously plenty of  food on the beach with invertebrates such as this crab plentiful in the rock pools and flies and bugs in amongst the masses of washed up and rotting kelp. 

Garganey and swarms of sand martins at Pennington Flash

The pair of garganey which commutes between Lightshaw and Pennington Flash was today at the latter and showing well just off the spit near the still closed Horrock's hide. Also today around 3000 sand martins and my first house martin of the year. Lightshaw was pretty quiet, just the now regular four black-tailed godwits.

Common sandpiper Pennington Flash

A common sandpiper was at Pennington Flash yacht club this morning, amazingly my earliest ever in the UK by 3 days. Offshore at least 1000 sand martins. 

I continued my walk to Lightshaw but the only thing of note there was a single black-tailed godwit. No sign of the recent garganey.

Lightshaw and Pennington Flash

Photo: Marsh marigold.

Migration is in full swing now, taking advantage of the good weather and southerly / easterly winds. Several willow warblers and blackcaps were in full song at Lightshaw and Pennington Flash, and a couple of swallows were at both places. There were hundreds of sand martins over Pennington and two whooper swans passed over heading north. Highlight was a pair of garganey at Lightshaw, probably the same birds as at Pennington last week.