Latest Sightings
Autumn Migration is beginning to get under way now, with our first pink-footed geese flocks of the autumn being seen on the reserve over the past week. Today, 21 of them dropped in briefly in-front of Gordon Taylor hide. Some of our wintering ducks are also beginning to arrive, with 4 wigeon, also from Gordon Taylor hide, and many of our ducks are in the process of moulting out of their eclipse plumages.
There are also good numbers of waders passing through the reserve at the moment with good numbers of black-tailed godwits and ruff seen from Gordon Taylor, Ron Barker, United Utilities and the Discovery hide. The numbers of juvenile ruff passing through the reserve are also building with every day. There were 5 Juv little-ringed plovers seen from Ron Barker hide and a further 2 seen from Gordon Taylor. Green sandpipers can be seen (and heard!) from various parts of the reserve, with a minimum of 4 on the Mere, 2-3 from Gordon Taylor and United Utilites and 2 from Ron Barker. A wood sandpiper was also reported from Ron Barker this Afternoon.
There is plenty of hirundines around with good numbers of young swallows all over the reserve with a few sand martins mixed in and a cloud of around 40 house martins were in the air near Reines hide. Cetti's warblers are singing away in the scrub and reedbeds of the reserve and can be heard well from Janet Kear hide, where there is also plenty of greenfinches, goldfinches, chaffinches and a bullfinch was heard calling. There is also a number chiffchaffs and young willow warblers in the trees above the path towards harrier hide.
Other species of interest were 2 water rail heard calling (Gordon Taylor hide and reedbed), a kingfisher from Harrier hide, a hobby flew over the Mere around lunch time and a tawny owl landed on a fence post next to the mere at dusk.
North West Bird Watching Festival 2022
Join us at this year’s Bird Watching Festival and watch up to 30,000 pink-footed geese return to the roost. We’ll have guest speakers, exhibitors, photography workshops and guided reserve walks for a full day out from dawn till dusk. Find out more
