Birding Group Martin Mere and Marshside 24th September 2019

The last birding group day of the month was left open for a decision nearer the time. The weather was predicted to be quite bad so a lot of people were put off but five of us took the risk and the risk was well rewarded with a good year tick and some great early Autumn sights.

We all met up in the Discovery Hide where it was pretty quiet but the constant shifting around of skeins of Pink-footed Geese was very impressive and is always one of the great pleasures of autumn at Martin Mere. It started to rain a bit and this seemed to excite the Snipe as there were flocks of them flying around all the time. At one point we saw a flock of forty!

We got a bit of a dry spell so we went on to the Ron Barker hide where we got even more Pink Foots and a couple of Marsh Harriers. We came back down, dropping in to the Rains Observatory which was totally devoid of birds at all!

Over at the United Utilities hide we got even more Pink Foots – I believe that there are 10,000 in the fields around the reserve at the moment though we didn’t see any Whooper Swans. There were several Snipe here as well and a smattering of Ruff. We got a Marsh Harrier here and there may have been a distant Buzzard on a post but it was hard to see through the rain at the distance.

It was getting on a bit and we were keen to try Marshside for the Red-necked Phalarope that had been reported there for a few days now, sometimes on Polly’s Pool and sometimed down by Nel’s hide. It was still dry-ish when we got there so we got to the Sandgrouser’s hide where you can get a bit of a view of Polly’s Pool. We probably spent about half an hour in the hide watching the most torrential of rain come pouring down. There was a birder in the hide there that had seen the Phalarope that morning but he said it was showing only intermittently . It was a long way away so all we could really see were ducks lots of Black-tailed Godwits. A fly-by in front of the hide by a Sparrowhawk gave some entertainment while we waited for the rain to stop. Eventually it did and we started walking down to Nel’s hide in the hope that it might have moved over there.

We had only got few yards down the path when we ran into a birder that told us that there was nothing much down at Nel’s and he suggested that you could get a much better view of Polly’s Pool if you walked past the Sandgrouser’s hide and down to where there is a bench. From there, he informed us, we would get a much better view of the pool so we decided to take his advice and turned tail and followed him up there.

About ten minutes later we found the bench and it was, indeed, a much better view of both Polly’s Pool and the fields over that side that are often filled with birds.The pool had plenty of Godwits, Teal, Wigeon and Mallards on and around it but there was no sight of the Phalarope. A Kestrel entertained us for a bit and then I got on the bird, not out in the water spinning around as you would expect, but hugging the edge of the water and being quite straight-forward in its feeding habits. Perhaps it had found enough food without venturing out into the open. It disappeared again but soon came back out again giving us pretty good views. With a good year tick under our belts, we returned to the cars hoping to avoid another downpour.

We got back to the cars dry but we had to take a rather different route back to the motorway taking the “high road” to the M6 to avoid the flooding of the roads. Even the route we took was deep under water at many stretches and we were quite relieved when we eventually got to the motorway. and then safely home. The weather had turned out to be as bad as predicted and there was heavy flooding of roads in many parts of England.

Bird Sightings Martin Mere Environs 24th September 2019

Species	No
Common Pheasant	2
Common Wood Pigeon	8
Eurasian Magpie	6
Carrion Crow	4
Eurasian Blue Tit	8
Great Tit	6
European Robin	2
Dunnock	1
Common Chaffinch	4
European Greenfinch	8
European Goldfinch	8

Bird Sightings Martin Mere Ron Barker Hide 24th September 2019

Species	No
Greylag Goose	100
Pink-footed Goose	6000
Canada Goose	20
Mute Swan	4
Mallard	100
Common Teal	200
Grey Heron	1
Eurasian Marsh Harrier	2

Bird Sightings Martin Mere United Utilities Hide 24th September 2019

Species	No
Pink-footed Goose	6000
Eurasian Wigeon	2
Mallard	100
Common Teal	100
Northern Lapwing	150
Ruff	3
Common Snipe	10
Eurasian Marsh Harrier	1

Bird Sightings Marshside 24th September 2019

Species	No
Gadwall	8
Eurasian Wigeon	200
Mallard	50
Common Teal	100
Black-tailed Godwit	500
Red-necked Phalarope	1
Little Egret	4
Eurasian Sparrowhawk	1
Eurasian Kestrel	1