21 December 2011

Quite a warm morning although rather breezy with a north westerly wind, after all the snow, ice and rain the water levels have really picked up with all the streams full of water including the one by the bottom entrance to the reserve which has been empty all summer, there was just a little ice left which is on the top pool.

The playing field had 4 Pied Wagtails among the Black-headed Gulls and Canada Geese and 2 Jays were calling from the small wood at the back of the boating lake, 3 male Goosanders were on here before locating over to the main lake later, on the main lake 48 Tufted Duck, 2 male and a female Goldeneye, 4 Mute Swans and 17 Pochard.

Everywhere else was very quiet with the only other birds of note being 10+ Redwings flying over the old sewage works and a couple of Mistle Thrushes by the top entrance.

Don't forget to check @westportlake1 for all Nicks daily sightings.

09 December 2011

All been rather quiet at Westport recently, highlight was a week yesterday with a male Pintail on the main lake for a hour or so, If I remember right it's the 3rd or 4th record this year but my first for the year, Tufted Duck numbers have remained steady at 60+ apart from a good count of 90+ earlier in the week by Nick, Pochard have remained steady with around 13+ most days, a male Goldeneye is still present but no sign of the female from last week, on Saturday 3 Goosanders came in with just the male staying on and the 2 females flying south, 2 Teal were in the back, also a Buzzard in the trees, a single Cormorant flew over the gas works as did a single Jackdaw.

From Westport we went onto Belvide to see the Tundra Bean Goose, also here were a couple of Pintail and a couple of Dunlin.

Next stop was Gailey Res to see the Black Redstart, although we had to wait for it to show and then only briefly it was worth the wait, thanks to Steve Seal for the photo below.

We then had a decision to make as to were to go next and settled for Clee Hill to see the Desert Wheatear which had been seen several times that morning, sadly on arrival an after a hour or so in fading light we had to admit defeat, in fact all we saw here was a few Ravens and a single Stonechat.

Late news for Saturday at Westport was 2 Egyptian Geese seen by the warden.