Martin Mere 12th January 2013

A bright winters day and an exam behind me, a new year with few opportunities to get out,  today it was time to go birding again. With friends from Lancaster I drove down the M6 to the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust reserve at Martin Mere near Southport, on the Lancashire Coastal Plain, about forty minutes South of Lancaster.  In stark contrast to the terrain up here, the area is disconcerting flat, a landscape at odds with my previous experience of this county. At the time of my last visit back on October I had been impressed with the site in general, but a little disappointed not to find the huge numbers of swans associated with other sites in the area. As we drove down narrow but appropriately named “Curlew Way,” a single track road through the flat country which represents one of the approaches to the site, we saw a number of swans grazing beside the road.

Drake Pintail

We arrived just after 11, and made our way through the wooden visitors centre and into the “duck zoo” area. At many of its Wetlands Centre the Trust manages a collection of wildfowl and other creatures from the wetlands of the world, and Martin Mere is  no exception. The flamingos were beautiful to look at, as were the eider with which they rather inexplicably shared a pond, the latter cooing contentedly. A few Whooper Swans seemed to have ventured into the duck zoo as well, and it was these which were to be rather the stars of the day.

Whooper Swans and Greylag Goose.

We made our way through the heavy metal gates and leaving the domesticated waterfowl behind us made our way to the Raines Observatory, one of several wooden hides overlooking the lake and reed beds. The sheer density of wild waterfowl was impressive, and “never seen so many birds in one place in my life” comments were overheard. The ground in front of the hide was muddy, disturbed by the big feet of the Whooper Swans (Cygnus cygnus) and Greylag Geese (Anser anser) both of which were present in dozens. On the shore ran Ruffs (Philomachus pugnax), smart wintering waders enjoying the relatively benign conditions of the Mere, while their breeding sites on the continent become uninhabitable.  A couple of Lapwings (Vanellus vanellus) whistled and flew their big, sweeping display flights, on their distinctive broad wings over the water. In the water were a number of handsome drake Pintail (Anas acuta) with chocolate brown heads and white neck flashes, large, only subtly smaller than the Mallards (A. platyrynchos) but far more slender and elegant than their more abundant relative, with sharply pointed tails in both sexes, the drake’s sharp, black tail quill giving the species its name.  Teal, widgeon and shelduck were also here among the ducks. In the distance skeins of pink-footed geese flew in and alighted on the fields adjacent to the reserve.  It was an overheard comment about a Green-Winged Teal being seen from the Ron Barker hide which spurred us on to move.  Enquiries revealed the bird had been sitting on an outflow pipe “right in front of” the Ron Barker hide.

Ruff with drake Teal (r) and Pintail (l) behind

Wandering on down the path toward the Ron Barker Hide, named for an early supporter and friend of Sir Peter Scott, founder of the WWT, we came to a split in the path, and of course followed the spur which led us through some promising looking scrub woodland. A mixed flock of passerines above us had my attetion. Identifying birds from immediately below as they forage for seeds in the alders was something of a challenge, but as one of the birds turned to extract some seeds from a choice catkin it revealed a chestnut crown and a black cheek marking that was distinctive. A tree sparrow! A lovely bird and a year tick. Some people passing us seemed intrigued by what we’d found, only to walk away uninterested when we said it was a Tree Sparrow. Having, not so long ago, expected to travel to Dungeness to see this charming species, a close relative of the more familiar house sparrow, I was rather surprised by their indifference. Perhaps they’d been to Eastern Asia where it is far more common.   The tree sparrow was accompanied by chaffinches and a couple of goldfinches, which busied themselves feeding on the alder trees.

Pintail pair (front) and Widgeon pair (back)

We reached the Ron Barker hide, and looked out over the open expanse of wetland. There were several Teal about, and a scruffy individual swimming in the ditch immediately outside the hide briefly caught my attention.  It turned out to be just that as a couple beside us had found the Green Winged Teal (Anas carolinensis) sitting on an outflow pipe as described, well out of the range of binoculars. They let us have a glance through their telescope, and although not terribly distinctive, the vertical white line on its flank, and the absence of a horizontal one, was clear to see. This American bird had presumably been blown of course during a flight down the Eastern seaboard of the United States, and, reluctantly, one imagines, became one of the handful of birds to cross the Atlantic to Britain every year. We would, I admit, never have found it without the help of the couple with the scope, but what a lovely bird! The white line is something I’d think to look for, scanning through flocks of teal with the bins for it, but this bird is a first. It was far too distant for a photo, but it is memorable. 

As we sat in the Ron Barker hide we saw the distant flocks of pink feet moving again, and watched a Grey Heron fly along the length of a small channel cut into the grassland in front of us, spooking several Teal (Anas creccia) and Widgeon (Anas penelope) into making brief flights. We took lunch and watched a Little Grebe diving about in the drainage channel. Gadwall and  Shoveller seemed curiously conspicuous by their absence.

View of Martin Mere

From the Ron Barker we went into the Kingfisher hide, a pill-box like, reinforced-looking structure, which offers panoramic views of the wide, flat landscape and the Marshes. Once the largest body of freshwater in Lancashire, prior to several drainage attempts for agriculture, a shared history with many of Europe’s wetlands, the lake and surrounding marshland still looks huge from here. There were noisy finches in the trees behind the concrete hide, but a scan through the flock revealed them to be composed of common greenfinches and chaffinches, scarcer finches absent, surprising given the sites’ tree sparrows and the richness of other wet woodlands nearby. Perhaps it lacks the continuity and large area of similar woodlands in Lancashire. A large bird of prey sitting on a fence turned out to be a Buzzard. It sat calmly on the fence, apparently uninterested in the cluster of brave or foolhardy teal and mallard which swam in a pool beside it.  Sometimes these dramatic birds will take up perches like this to hunt for worms, looking for movement in the mud or grassland beneath. It is an effective strategy, Buzzards in Holland are thought to thrive on worms, although phrases like “reduced to hunting worms,” an anthropomorphism, are forgivable when considering the majesty of raptors like this when they are more commonly encountered, doing things like soaring over open moorland.

Asian Short Clawed Otter

We headed into the Duck Zoo for the inevitable cooing over otters experience. The Kits had grown since my last visit, and were as big as their parents. They came trooping over for the whitebait one of the guides threw them. Again we were advised to swim in the Amazon with the huge and highly territorial Giant River Otters which feed on Piranhas in it. Someone should probably advise the enthusiastic and otherwise well-informed volunteer of the folly in this before some young traveller sues him for a lost arm.  The Asian Short Clawed otters here had none of their South American relative’s menace and elicited the inevitable cooing noises that only otters can generate. The otter feed takes place only half an hour before the wild swan feed. Having encountered this at the WWT’s site at Welney on the Cambridgeshire/Suffolk/Norfolk border, down South, I was keen to see it again. What awaited us when we reached the Swan Link hide was impressive, and indeed somewhat breathtaking. Hundreds of the big white adult Whooper Swans with their black and yellow beaks, plus a handful of greyer Juveniles, with paler beaks, were waiting eagerly on and by the lake shore. There were greylags, more Pintails than one could shake a stick at, Mallards, a few of the feral farmyard type, Teal and Widgeon, but the swans! It is an experience well worth the WWT entrance fare and a fine demonstration of what a good cause it goes to. These birds had flown in from Iceland, where they breed, for the winter, in their family groups, and now they were gathered, spectacularly, just feet away from us.  A man walking down with a wheelbarrow signalled the beginning of the feeding frenzy. He walked along the muddy shore and scattered grain for the hungry and expectant waterfowl. Ducks scurried about the feet of the swans grabbing what they could and trying to avoid the hard beaks of the Whoopers, which would deliver a sharp peck if the ducks came close. The Ruffs, uninterested in the food, just scurried about bemused by the activity around them.  The swans and ducks plumage was soon muddy from the churned, wet earth. Shelducks seemed to have adopted a habit of flying over the swans, grabbing a few unattended seeds, and then flying back over the swans before they were noticed.  The smaller species seemed more vulnerable to getting a sharp peck from one of the aggressive swans. As the man passed by and the seeds had largely been filtered from the mud by broad beaks of various sizes, a calm descended. We took the opportunity to have a look at some distant Cormorants (Phalacrocorax carbo) through someone’s scope, one of them was already developing the white markings on the neck which marked it as a subspecies sinensis, more typical of central and southern Europe than Lancashire. Another which appeared to be a juvenile held its wings spread to dry its feathers in the wind.  

Swans waiting to be fed.

Shelduck.

 

Despite the beauty and spectacle of the densely birded Wild Side, we decided to check out a little more of the duck zoo.  Although it has never truly caught my imagination I was encouraged by the interest among my friends that the global waterfowl collection seemed to generate. We saw a Black Swan, handsome American Buffleheads, and stunning Mandarin and Carolina Wood Ducks from China and the USA respectively. It would of course have been far more exciting to encounter these species as vagrants on the wild side, but they were pretty and I suppose the educational value in showing people the world’s wetlands, and telling them about the threats they face cannot be bad. Nonetheless after a no-show, again, from the WWT’s elusive Beavers, we went back out to the wild side and down to the smart, elegantly carved “Harrier Hide” which overlooks some wetland recently reclaimed from agriculture for wetland wildlife, its drainage reversed. I’d hoped for a Marsh Harrier, or a Short Eared Owl quartering over the reeds, but no such luck. We’d seen a Kestrel on the way up so I would have to be content with a two-raptor day. A few Tufted Ducks and sleepy Teal sat about on the water, and some mallards, one a white farmyard type, browsed in a shallow pool. The sun had begun to set, staining the sky a deep red, reflecting off the cirrus clouds which had gathered in it.  We made our way back to the car in the fading light, the honking of the geese still ringing in our ears.

Sunset over Martin Mere

Full Species List: (broadly, international common names used, my preference)

 En Route: Pheasant (Phasianus colchicus) Kestrel (Falco tinnunculus) Starling (Sturnus vulgaris)

At Martin Mere in the wild:  Whooper Swan (Cygnus cygnus) Greylag Goose (Anser anser) Pink Footed Goose (Anser brachyrynchus) Eurasian Teal (Anas creccia) Northern Pintail (Anas acuta) Mallard (Anas platyrynchos) Feral Duck (Anas platyrynchos. ssp domesticus) Eurasian Widgeon (Anas penelope) Green Winged Teal (Anas carolinensis) Shelduck (Tadorna tadorna) Eurasian Coot (Fulica atra) Common Moorhen (Gallinula chloropus) Pochard (Aythya ferina) Tufted Duck (Aythya fuligula) Little Grebe (Tachybaptus ruficolis) Great Cormorant (Phalacrocorax carbo ssp. carbo & P. carbo ssp sinensis) Ruff (Philomachus pugnax) Northern Lapwing (Vanellus vanellus) Grey Heron (Ardea cinerea) Black Headed Gull (Chroicocephalus ridibundus) Common Buzzard (Buteo buteo) Feral Pigeon (Columba livia) Common Woodpigeon (Columba palumbens) Collared Dove (Streptopelia decaocto) Carrion Crow (Corvus corone)  Blue Tit (Cyanistes caeruleus) Great Tit (Parus major) European Blackbird (Turdus merula) Redwing (Turdus iliacus) European Robin (Erithacus Rubecula) Dunnock (Prunella modularis) Common Chaffinch (Fringilla coelebs) European Greenfinch (Carduelis chloris) Goldfinch (Carduelis carduelis) Eurasian Tree Sparrow (Passer montanus) 

Wild Lands And Wet Fowls

Saturday 29^th September took me to the rather stunning Wild lands and Wet fowls Trust reserve on the road to Liverpool at Martin Mere, in the company of some lovely and hung-over Mancunians. We braved the entrance fee, which always feels a little more than one might expect at WWT reserves, although I was sufficiently impressed by the reserve to claim it back off my membership,  and made our way initially to the captive waterfowl collection.  We allowed ourselves to be charmed by the two small and two very small Asian Short-Clawed otters while they were fed by the keeper,  a small compensation for the Eurasian Otter no-show at Leighton Moss a couple of days ago. These diminutive otters are incredibly cute, and seem to be the most popular species as zoo animal, perhaps on account of their social nature and relatively minimal space requirements. The keeper reminded us that the largest otter in the world is the Amazon river otter, which feeds on Piranhas in the South American river basin, and suggested keeping one close for safety. Most commentators seem to be of the view that the Amazon River Otter is a six-foot long predator every bit as powerful as a jaguar and more than happy to defend its territory against crocodiles. 

Asian Short Clawed Otter. Also capable of defending itself against crocodiles, through cooperation and strength in numbers.

Pair of handsome red-crested Pochards.

The otter feeding was charming and so were the lovely red-crested Pochards and Eider which occupied the next pool, sharing it with some wilder coots and moorhens. The captive wildfowl collections at the WWT centres, they have more in Barnes, have a clear conservation value and are no doubt an educational resource also. The WWT have also bred birds in captivity for release into the wild as part of invaluable reintroduction schemes, and maintain populations of birds which are threatened by habitat destruction. This doesn’t leave me unconcerned about the practice of pinioning wildfowl. The captive birds here (as opposed to the wild ones, separated by predator-proof fencing and largely in another part of the site) have had part of their wings removed to render them flightless. This practice is illegal in ducks kept on farms, but the WWT do it to prevent their wildfowl escaping. It does not sit easy that birds can be rendered permanently flightless, and how it impacts on their experience to be so damaged is unclear. I suppose pinioning is preferable to a repeat of the sorry tale of the Ruddy Duck, which was exterminated in recent years for expanding the gene pool available to an isolated population of the closely related White Headed Ducks in Spain, having initially escaped from, according to anecdotal evidence, another Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust exhibit in the 1980s.   The practice is carried out when the birds are chicks and supposedly do not suffer long term consequences aside from the intended, indeed, they appear to live normal lives, breeding well,  and the Trust has maintained these exhibits for the public for decades.


As we walked around the “Duck Zoo,” even while watching the Otter show, my eyes were being drawn skyward, and looking over the large Wetlands Centre, my anticipation for a look at the wild birds was growing. There were, occasionally, arrivals and departures, and sometimes just nervous flocks taking to the sky, of huge numbers of noisy, honking geese.  

To my surprise, there were still a few butterflies about, we saw Comma and Red Admirals feeding, and sunning themselves, on and around a buddleia beside the very quiet Beaver enclosure inside the captive waterfowl area. These beautiful nymphalids spend the winter as adults, often tucked up in the corners of outhouses and other cold buildings, and presumably in caves and hollow trees, to re-emerge when the weather becomes warmer, not reproducing until they emerge from this hibernation the following spring. These two were clearly feeding up before their long sleep.

Comma butterfly with autumnal hawthorne berries.

We made our way out of the “Duck Zoo” and onto the Martin Mere reserve “proper.” Martin Mere is a lake, situated in an unusually flat part of West Lancashire, which is fringed by wetland habitats, some reclaimed from farmland in more recent years, and some artificial scrapes used for the dual purposes of habitat creation and cleaning the water as it flows of farmland and into the Mere itself. Immediately outside the hide were the usual suspects, plus elegant pintails, somewhere out in the water a male almost in his full breeding plumage, with a chocolate brown head, while a pair, the male still in eclipse, dabbled closer to us.  The pintail is one of the most attractive of the wintering wild ducks, with the females and eclipse males having an unusual grace about them, elegant, more slightly built than some of their relatives, with longer necks and prominent tails.   A pair of teal flew low across the water and several more were around.

We walked up the muddy track toward the Harrier Hide, a wooden hide built in the shape of a bird of prey, or perhaps some Native American totem, which looks out over some marshland recently reclaimed from arable use.  A drake Shoveller sat contentedly on one of the grassy islands rising from the shallow water, as did a single Pink footed Goose and a smart Lesser Black Backed Gull.  There were relatively few birds to see despite the promising expanse of marshland we had in front of us. I’d hoped to catch sight of one of the promised Harriers or perhaps some other raptor hunting over the grass.  A shelduck grazed, while black headed gulls squabbled. It was at this hide that my camera battery gave out, finally, and I must thank Kel and Jack for the loan of their camera to take a couple of shots, including those which feature in this blog post.

Teal, Shelduck and Black Headed Gulls

We walked back along a muddy path to the visitors centre. Signs promised Tree Sparrows, the reserve being host to a colony, but we only saw a few blue and great tits on the feeding station, which was surprising given the diversity of birds around those at Leighton Moss.   I also elected to return to the visitors centre and become a member of the WWT, partly to gain free entry to some of the trusts’ other reserves, like Barnes in London, and Welney in Norfolk, and also to support their work preserving threatened wetland wildlife the world over. The WWT, alongside the RSPB and others is among the leading organisations working to establish a captive breeding population of Spoonbilled Sandpipers, an endangered species from Pacific Asia.

We walked around the corner past the gates to the car park and made our way to the final hide we’d visit that day and found it a spectacle. Pink footed Geese fly in from Iceland in October to spend the winter in the relative warmth of the British winter, and at Martin Mere, among other sites, they gather in their thousands. Estimates put the numbers there that day at around 12000. Skeins of the noisy, honking geese were returning from grazing on nearby farmers fields, where they are sometimes chased away when they threaten to eat the new shoots of Autumn-sown crops.   On the ground they were joined by a dozen or so Whooper Swans. From time to time, some of the Geese would take to the air, and others would return from feeding grounds further away. Greylag Geese also grazed outside the hide, although some of the islands had been reduced to mud by the action of so many feeding waterfowl.  Sometimes the teal would go up, perhaps responding to some terrestrial, or low flying predator outside of our view, and at times thousands of birds filled the evening sky, teal, pintail and goose.   But it was the V formations of Pink Footed Geese which provided the greatest spectacle. These migrants from the arctic, returning to their winter roost by the hundred.  These spectacular flocks seem to be the main features of reserves managed by the WWT.  They certainly maintain some special places.

Pink Footed Geese. Many.

Carelessly I also managed to leave my binoculars in one of the hides-fortunately, the typical honesty one associates from such places had prevailed and they had been returned to the visitors centre, giving me an excuse to make a repeat visit the following day.  On my return visit I managed to get a bit closer to the beautiful Whooper swans, taking in a hide to distant from the centre for us to reach on the first visit. Sadly I was without camera, but I must return when more of these birds are present. I also saw a Marsh Harrier and a couple of Widgeon,  the grazing duck which frequents wet meadows through the winter. A warden explained how local arable farmers bring some if their rejected potatoes to the reserve to feed the birds, distracting them from feeding on potentially more valuable crops.  

The work of the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust is excellent and worthwhile, and, though I can take or leave their “duck zoos” of artificially flightless birds, they maintain some of the most stunning wetland habitats around on their reserves, and their conservation work is impeccable, so I was pleased to add another window sticker to the small collection in my car.

Heybridge Basin

Saturday afternoon took me and my good friend Becky up to Heybridge Basin near Maldon, in the car to hone my driving skills. It lies where a canal meets the River Blackwater, effectively the estuary of the river Chelmer in North Essex.  We parked up in the free, council run car park on a grey afternoon, and wandered down a short length of canal to the village which stands beside the ‘basin,’ a sort of parking area and maintenance yard for canal boats. There were a number of Common Terns fishing around the spot where the fresh water of the canal passes through lock gates into the Blackwater.  A few black-headed gulls were there too, more powerful birds than the terns in many ways, which kept out of their way. The Black-headed gulls did not compete with the Terns in the grace and style stakes though, the forked tailed, almost angelic “sea swallows” made the larids look dumpy and inelegant. That said, the last time Bexx and I had met Terns, on a sunny day in Northumberland almost exactly a year previously,  they had attacked us. We were in the Farne Islands, and on one of the islands they just dive bombed any visitor stepping withing the colony, making contact with their beaks! Terns look pointy at the best of times. When they're going for the top of your head they are very pointy indeed. Today, however, they just allowed us to stand impressed by grace and fishing prowess. 

Beautiful Common Tern.

The salt marsh which borders the estuary separating Hebridge from the historic town of Maldon was alive, the vegetation was green and though of course the wintering birds are long gone, and the Autumn passage migrants yet (but soon) to arrive in any numbers, the peeping calls of Oystercatchers regularly broke through, and, as we walked the sound of Gulls became louder. A lone Little Egret shook his feet in the shallow, muddy water, and moved with elegant high-stepping motion across the mud. He seemed to dislike having a camera pointed at him and was soon on the wing, steadily, almost casually, making his exit from view across the saltmarsh. 

Little Egret at Heybridge

A number of old sand or gravel pits near Heybridge, between the canal and the Blackwater, have been turned over to nature, and black headed gulls, apparently in their hundreds, have taken to nesting on the small, gravelly islands. Tufted Ducks were about, some of the males still in their striking black and white but some turning over into their duller eclipse plumage, as were some of the drake mallards which were about too. A few swallows were hunting insects, sweeping around near the waters surface and over its grassy margins, never appearing to cross the Blackwater.  A cormorant flew overhead, straight and true, a jet-black adult.  There were a few Whitethroats and Acrocephalus spp. warblers singing in the bushes and lakeside vegetation, but passerine activity was a little disappointing, a couple of greenfinches flew over our heads. I’d seen a cuckoo there a couple of years ago, with my father who always seems to find cuckoos, but there wasn’t one about today. This breeze probably wasn’t helping, and nor was the cold. 

View of the River Blackwater from Heybridge.

Maldon’s sea front is dominated by bright building fronts, an old church and the wide Marine Park, the fountains of which could be seen from across the river. A stretch of tidal river, lined with lush saltmarshes, separates it from Heybridge. Here a number of shelducks filter-fed in the mud, and a couple more of these lovely, big white and black ducks flew over. Shelducks congregate in Northern Germany to moult, evidently these birds had yet to leave, and retained their smart breeding plumage, which includes an iridescent green head and red bill, and a chestnut band around their chests, in both sexes.  These handsome birds specialise in life around river estuaries, and are common in places like this but scarce in other habitats, some wintering on gravel pits, but rarely far from the coast.

Maldon

Maldon is a pretty town, when viewed from back here, and today there was some live music coming out of it, apparently from one of the towns old pubs.  Its sea front is dominated by bright building fronts, an old church and the wide Marine Park, the fountains of which could be seen from across the river. As the sky began spitting rain on us, I wondered if a boat over the river would be a good plan.  We walked on, past several cute, small rabbits, and reached a bank of spectacular, and very photogenic wild flowers.  These bordered some new build housing, presumably a backwater of the one-horse town of Heybridge.  Perhaps they had been put down as a seed mix as mitigation for the loss of habitat resultant from the building. Poppies nodded in the wind, beside camomile and some of the most brilliantly electric blue cornflowers I have ever seen. The flowers were popular with bees, and I wondered if more invertebrate fauna might be forthcoming were the weather a little less grey, and becoming colder. 

A wildflower mix. Instant wildlife for developers.

Luckily the rain continued to hold off as we walked back up the canal to the free car park which stands by it. We passed the narrowboats on the canal, which looked far more charming than the millionaires’ motor yachts which sat alongside more elegant sailing craft in the Basin itself. Although the two, appropriately nautically-themed pubs looked appealing for a glass of branded cola and a warm up, we had a dinner invitation in Witham to take up. Oh yeah, because I can drive now. Which is win. 

Black Headed Gull at Heybridge Basin. These breed in substantial numbers on the old gravel pits.