Summary : March 2014

Summary : March2014

Garden

With the weather being changeable so was the garden birding. On colder days nothing much was about but on the warmer, sunnier days, we had quite a few visitors. On the 13th we had pairs each of Goldfinch, Blue and Great Tits, Dunnock, House Sparrows, Blackbirds and even Mistle Thrushes. A single Starling also seems to be hanging around. The inevitable return of the Woodpigeons has also taken place. Towards the end of the month the birds were starting to think that spring was in sight and the garden started to fill with displaying Dunnocks and contending Blackbirds. A Blue Tit checked out the nest box on our chimney and a day or so later it started working on it. It seemed content with the box itself but kept pecking at the hole and trying _ I believe – to smooth it out. It continued doing this until the very end of the month when it then disappeared for a day. What would April bring ?

Birding Days Out

We had a few solo days out in March, the first being a somewhat misjudged trip on the 2nd March to Hoylake, New Brighton, Parkgate and Burton Mere Wetlands On the positive side we did get a couple of Short-eared Owls and the first Avocets of the year. On the following day we also had a somewhat misjudged attempt to walk in the Tatton Park woods – which were closed. A diversion to Rostherne Mere, however, proved interesting and we got our first Goosander of the year. On the 9th we went to WWT Martin Mere in a successful attempt to see the male Ruff in near-full breeding plumage !

Birding Group Days Out

The first birding group outing of the month was to Burton Mere Wetlands and Parkgate for a highish tide – 9.9m. This was a little disappointing as the water didn’t come very far in but we got great views of a pair of Marsh Harriers. Our second trip was to Moore Nature Reserve where we sort of got a Woodpecker hat-trick. We saw Lesser Spotted and Great Spotted but only heard the Green Woodpecker despite spending quite some time trying to locate a bird that was clearly only a few hundred feet from us ! We also got a Siskin – a year tick for us. The following week we saw Long-tailed Duck and Golden Plover at RSPB Marshside and we also got a Water Rail at Mere Sands Woods.
On the 25th Frodsham Marsh was cancelled due to rain and we went instead to Pennington Flash where the highlights were the first Sand Martins of the year and an aural spotting of a Cetti’s Warbler singing loud, long and clearly
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