May 2024 Summary including visits to Wigan Flashes, Burton Mere Wetlands, Leighton Moss, Brockholes and Upper Goyt Valley. Twenty-Six new year ticks and a total, so far, of 114 species for the year. Plus what’s happened in the garden in May.
I always look forward to our visits to the Upper Goyt Valley and Danebower Quarry as we often get some special birds. This time we didn’t get any of the Flycatchers or Redstarts that we often get but we still managed to get six year-ticks.
On the 15th May we left Ye Old Fighting Cocks pub and drove down to RSPB Leighton Moss. We were hoping for another sighting of the Osprey but we were out of luck. The Bitterns were all booming away and it was quite a dry hour or so we spent there.
The birding group had arranged to go to RSPB Leighton Moss on 14 May but a bad weather report put everyone off. We had already booked a room at Ye Old Fighting Cocks in Silverdale (don’t say here again) and it was too late to cancel, so we decided to go ahead on our own while the birding group went to Burton Mere Wetlands.
Our idea for this lovely sunny and wind-free day was to stop off at Burton Mere Wetlands briefly before going on to Hoylake for the high tide which was due to be 9.7 metres at 13:39hrs. We felt that, with no wind, we didn’t have to get there too early to catch the tide. How wrong we were.
The first birding group morning out of the month was on 7th May to Wigan Flashes. I’m not too sure if we were all that keen, as it is often better in winter, but it was a lovely sunny day and our expectations were exceded – especially on our way back from the flashes.
Birding group visits to the Wirral (9), Pennington Flashes (16) and Macclesfield Forest (30) and birds in our garden.
We had a full house of around 13 people for our morning visit to Macclesfield Forest. It was a nice, sunny day but with a bit of a wind. We started out looking for Garden Warblers in the lower part of the uphill track but I don’t think anone actually saw one. As we continued…
There were only two cars of people for the birding group visit to Pennington Flash. We had to park on the main road as the car park was closed for electrical work that was being done at the bridge on the way down to the car park. We imagined it might be to connect the…
We had a birding group visit to the Wirral scheduled for the high tide on the 9th April but with a storm developing overnight and in full force during the day, most of the group decided to stay at home. Anne and I and three others in a car from Didsbury braved the weather, though,…
