Flocks roosting on South Walney salt-marsh High-tide and the salt-marsh is inundated, ribbons of green submerged beneath the blue. After a good feed, flocks roost on the shore-line. They're indistinct but Knot, probably Knot. In the middle-distance Brent Geese continue grazing. A dark mantle looping beneath pale bellies gleaming in sunlight, a caparison of black on white. Through January, I've contemplated Brent Geese so in good light I can tell at a glance, afar off. Toward the horizon, a mystery flock shows in flight over the deep blue of Piel Channel with Barrow in Furness transformed in sunlight.
Returning from Groyne Hide, we look for the Knot flock but the birds are gone. On an ebb tide water-birds will begin to disperse across the island, on salt-marsh, mud-flats and on shoals out at sea. With seasonal migration and birds passing through there's much to discover. Photography gives retrospective pleasure, identifying birds, discovering a pair of Red Breasted Merganser unseen when sunlight dazzled. I read of Wigeon having a fondness for eelgrass, foraging in large groups on land and in shallow water. In bright sunlight the shallows are a gloss and sheen of reflected light so birds show in silhouette. They dabble on the surface or tip-up to reach submerged vegetation so little of their form is visible. Knowing that behaviour helps to interpret what is hidden.
If we'd come an hour later and visited the bird hides where we saw much of the action, all would have been quiet. Nothing much happening, with flocks dispersed and roosting out-of-sight on Shelley Bars, the green salt-marsh to the east and toward Morecambe Bay. Birding is often about coincidence and there's always something you'll miss. The men we met in Peggy Braithwaite HIde came too late to see male Eider. We missed the Barn Owl before Coast Guard Cottages. Small birds twittering in the bush beside the hide could have been Linnet but I'm good on Linnet vocals. May have been Twite which are around and I wouldn't recognise their call
If we'd come an hour later and visited the bird hides where we saw much of the action, all would have been quiet. Nothing much happening, with flocks dispersed and roosting out-of-sight on Shelley Bars, the green salt-marsh to the east and toward Morecambe Bay. Birding is often about coincidence and there's always something you'll miss. The men we met in Peggy Braithwaite HIde came too late to see male Eider. We missed the Barn Owl before Coast Guard Cottages. Small birds twittering in the bush beside the hide could have been Linnet but I'm good on Linnet vocals. May have been Twite which are around and I wouldn't recognise their call
Brent Geese graze of the last sliver of green, calling to each other as the tide inundates the salt-marsh but the water is so shallow that birds stand far out on a mirror-like sheen. The sun is in the south and the hide faces east so the birds are lit obliquely and colour is not easy to distinguish.
A pair of seals swims toward a flock of Oystercatcher on a sliver of salt-marsh about to be submerged and the birds take flight. At high-tide those ribbons of green are gone and so are the birds. But we come upon much larger flocks roosting on salt-marsh to the east. After feeding, they rest to conserve energy and will disperse on an ebb-tide.
We walk the western shore beside the Irish Sea and when we reach the newish sea-hide we realise it's been lifted from its concrete base, presumably by the recent Storm Eowyn, and dumped slightly inland in a hollow. It was sited on an exposed spot on windy Walney and didn't last long as it has only been in situ for a couple of years. It's predecessor flapped itself into oblivion. At first glance it has an interesting look but we don't feel the design works well for a bird hide, having wooden wings that block out the side view and windows that don't open so you'd sit with the sun making you drowsy. The new Peggy Braithwaite hide is more comfortable and with windows opening onto different aspects.
We walk the western shore beside the Irish Sea and when we reach the newish sea-hide we realise it's been lifted from its concrete base, presumably by the recent Storm Eowyn, and dumped slightly inland in a hollow. It was sited on an exposed spot on windy Walney and didn't last long as it has only been in situ for a couple of years. It's predecessor flapped itself into oblivion. At first glance it has an interesting look but we don't feel the design works well for a bird hide, having wooden wings that block out the side view and windows that don't open so you'd sit with the sun making you drowsy. The new Peggy Braithwaite hide is more comfortable and with windows opening onto different aspects.
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