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Leighton Moss with coot chicks and avocets

29/4/2025

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PictureWillow catkins gone to seed
   Drifting willow seed-heads are caught in sunlight on a still morning as the booming of bittern resounds across the reed-beds.   It's unusually hot  for late April and butterflies are on the wing,  whites and orange-tip.  Cuckoo flower and marsh marigold are in bloom.
 I come to at Leighton Moss with a hint of a wish-list,   a reprise of great crested grebe and coot chicks which I saw on this date two years ago.  Courtship behaviour,  parenting skills and interesting ways of how to rear young- it's not simply about identification.


 Seed-heads floating through sunlit air,  glimpses of butterflies,  floating feathers on still waters and the fresh green of May as trees come into leaf-  the ambience is delightful.  If there are coot chicks they'll be tiny and well-hidden in the reed-beds.   An adult coot swims to and fro before us,  where the reeds fringe the water.  I glimpse something red-  but I can't relocate it.  Perhaps I'm trying to conjure a chick into being.   There are mute swans and water birds in the distance but if there are coot chicks they're as close as we'll ever be- right in front of the hide.  
Birders go in quest of rarities and coot are abundant, easy to see and the adult is black with a white face shield and bill. There's cachet in discovering chicks because they're hard to see and such a startling contrast to the adult.  They're brightly coloured with wispy down.  The reed-bed habitat has new growth and a mulch of browned-off reeds that provide nesting material.  The coot nest is close to the water's edge and the adults are  attentive parents, keeping close and protective, tugging up vegetation and feeding their young.  Only two chicks when the average clutch is eight. I wonder how many have been lost to predation.  A parent mantles her chicks beneath her wings,  feeds them,  leads them toward the water's edge where they swim, tentatively, amongst the reeds.  Can that down be waterproof?  The adults preen,  keeping their feathers in good condition.  Just moving through that reed stubble must be a challenge for such tiny chicks.
In autumn, large flocks of coot can be seen on these fresh-water pools and that's a striking spectacle. 
Lower Hide has been rebuilt and its design is impressive.  The approach is via a wooden walkway that looks down onto the reed-bed so giving opportunities for studying warblers.  There's a space to park a wheelchair and access for the disabled has been well thought through at Leighton Moss.   
On 2nd May To the sea-hides.  Black-headed gull are raucous but seem to share islets with a smaller number of avocets- such an elegant bird. There was a large flock of black-tailed godwit- mostly non-breeding birds.  From the sea-hide we looked into the sun so the flock appeared in silhouette and I reckoned these were non-breeding birds, so of muted colour.   A birder with a scope set it up for us and I could then make -out a couple of birds with rusty red heads.   Throughout the time we watched the flock was roosting,  the outer row of birds watchful, and when a plane went by the flock rose and settled on a farther islet.
Another beautiful sunny day with butterflies on the wing and the fresh green of May all about us. 
There are stewards to welcome us to Leighton Moss and tell us what's about.  Sightings lists tell what's been seen recently from different hides.  The RSBP has a good idea of what draws visitors.  
In the hides, we see and hear for ourselves what excites our companions.   Coot chicks because their appearance is bizarre and unexpected.  Birding is a mix of sharing and competitiveness and I've watched folk ignore beautiful water birds in the pursuit of finding snipe which are  hard to see because of excellent camouflage.
At the sea-hides there's a party led by a woman who calls marsh harrier each time one appears in the distance,  ignoring birds much closer to the hide.
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    Jan Wiltshire is a nature writer living in Cumbria. She also explores islands and coast and the wildlife experience. (See Home and My Books)

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