I did manage to get a few shots of Lapwings as they flew in from the marsh but by the time the Pick footed geese did their nightly V-shaped fly-by the light level was too low to get any decent photographs.

Cow, ignoring the Lapwings and Widgeon... "Can't you see I'm eating?"

There were plenty of other birds in the area; Widgeon, Teal, Godwits, Oyster catchers – all the usual Autumn suspects but the only time they came within camera range was when the Sun hid behind the clouds forming over the sea to the west.

Evening sun lights up a flight of Lapwings at RSPB Marshside

Needless to say as the light level returned and the Sun bathed the area the golden glow the Geese were nowhere to be seen, the only evidence of them being their calls echoing from the surrounding fields.

Light… a photographers best friend and worst enemy…

All sorts of ducks on the River Douglas

After some fairly dismal weather these past couple of months I finally managed to get out for a walk along our local river, the Douglas, and as I’m a bit (understatement of the century) rusty I took out my camera just to check it (and me) is working as it should.

There wasn’t really much to see exfcept a lot of ducks including some Widgeon (which make the amazing whistling noise), Teal, Shelducks and the usual suspects of Mallard and Oyster catchers. I tried to get some pictures of them in flight but a small Duck is very very fast so I gave up.

Spring was certainly in the air today though as i saw a few lambs on my way down to the river, thankfully the boys below didn’t have any as it’s best to stay out of the way of sheep at lambing time so as not to distress the ewes and their newly birthed lambs.

"The Managment" of the banks bleats "non shall pass"

They do look a bit like the mafia though and it felt like I was trespassing on their field…

Hopefully, now the weather seems to be changing for the better I’ll get out fishing, it was almost this time last year that we fished this very river and caught a few Flounder – there were a few people fishing today but nobody had caught anything. It seems the seasons are a bit late this year, but i seem to recall someone saying that a cold winter heralds a hot summer – so here’s hoping…

RSPB Marshside

The weather forecast yesterday was horrific with almost 40mph winds and heavy rain so we cancelled our sea fishing trip and hence didn’t get any bait. Imagine my frustration on waking this morning to a light breeze and glorious sunshine – oh well, British weather, what can you do?

Not wanting to waste the fine weather I went walking around the Marshside RSPB reserve, near Southport, Merseyside. The drive took about 15 minutes and as I approached the car park down the coastal road I spotted a few bright white shapes on the seaward marsh. I quickly parked the car and raced back to the spot and got out the binoculars in time to see 4 Little Egrets, a first for me! To far a way for a good photo – I took a few but the birds were far to small in the images to make out.

Ducks Hiding

I slowly walked back down the coastal road, enjoying the huge flocks of Lapwing and Starlings until I got to the nearest hide. By now the wind was getting stronger (thank goodness I wasn’t fishing after all) so it was good to be in some shelter for a while.

Marshside is an amazing place if you stop for a while and look carefully at what you perceive to be empty fields. Most people will see the flocks of Lapwing flying overhead and the Pink-footed geese arriving in huge numbers to feed but look carefully and you will see thousands of small ducks; Widgeon, Teal, Pintail and Shoveler to name a few.

I spent a good hour just watching, being somewhat overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of winter visitors to our coastline.

Godwits at Marshside

At the second hide, which is about 500m further down the coastal path, the land is more open shallow water with the odd island. This is a favourite roosting patch for the many wading birds that visit our shore line as it provides a good safe refuge when the tide is too high for them to feed.

Again the area was covered in small ducks with many of the larger Shelduck present but as the tide reached it maximum height for the day huge flocks of Black-tailed godwits arrived. These will stay here until April when they travel to continental Europe to breed.

There are, however, a few breeding pairs that stay in the UK, three pairs on the Fylde Coast on the River Ribble estuary at Newton Marsh. These are the most northerly breeding birds in the UK out of a total of about 50 so are nationally very important to the species.

I made my way back to the car after a very enjoyable couple of hours doing nothing but watching birds – great!

I’ll leave you with a couple more shots just to tempt you into a visit.

Black-tailed godwits arriving as the tide pushes them off the beach.

A mixed flock of Lapwing and Starlings.