11 July 2012

It's been pretty quiet down Westport since my last visit on the 7th July, the big thing this year is the mud and soggy ground, for summer I can't believe just how bad the reserve area is, it's impossible to walk around without wellies as is most parts of the old sewage works, at least in winter with the cold ground it is'nt so bad, this has to have been one of the worse summers for a long long time and has without doubt affected the breeding birds, it's probably one of the reasons our own Canada Geese have only had half the numbers of goslings compared to last year.

To catch up since my last visit the only birds of note were three Common Sandpipers present on the 9th along with a juvenile Little Grebe, the first juvenile of the year and only the second Little Grebe of the year, and this morning Nick had a Kingfisher on the top pool, I had a look along with Phil Jones this afternoon but without joy, I still need it for my Westport year list.

Also present on this very quiet afternoon, I managed to count 12 Greylag Geese but there were probably a few more as they were rather spread out around the park this afternoon, on the main lake, five Great Crested Grebe, 4 adult and three cygnet Mute Swans and eight Tufted Duck and three Black-headed Gulls were flying around the lake.

The reserve area was very very quiet with hardly a single bird heard let alone seen, the only area were this didn't apply was the top pool with at least two singing Reed Warblers making plenty of noise to make up for everywhere else, a couple of Lesser Black-backed Gulls were also flying around the main lake and a adult Herring Gull flew over quite high up, a single Blackcap was singing near the old gas works were just a single Swallow was around the derelict buildings, on the old sewage works a single Whitethroat and Chiffchaff, back on the grass bank near the visitor centre I picked out the Barnacle Goose among the Canada Geese and lastly a couple of House Martins were flying around the boating lake.