Cestrian U3A

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BIRD GROUP AUTUMN MEETINGS 2009

16/10/2009

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Contact:         Tel. 01244 376164      e-mail:  cestrian.u3a@c117.myzen.co.uk

Please note  lifts are available by prior arrangement and directions are provided - please ring or e-mail Elizabeth on the weekend before the visit. - we don’t want anyone left behind!

All meetings start at 10.00 am unless posted otherwise

NEXT MEETING:

REPORT:

September

Pictures here of our visit to Pen-y-Ffrith Bird gardens in the summer.

Our meeting on September 8th was to Ellesmere & Wood Lane Nature Reserve.  On the mere were Mute Swans, Canada Geese & Greylag - some of which had hybridised with domestic geese.  Plenty of Mallard as usual, Herons on the island, Coot & Moorhen and Great Crested Grebe in the distance.  In a tree near the park entrance we saw a flock of Long-tailed Tits with Great & Blue Tits.  In the woods were Robins & Blackbirds, but we didn't see the usual Nuthatches & Tree Creepers.
After lunch we went to Wood Lane where we saw more Herons, a large flock of Lapwings and a Great Crested Grebe with her chicks.  Mallard & Moorhens were fossicking for scraps under a bird-feeder - patronised by Blue, Coal and Great Tits and an immature Greenfinch - and we got a brief glimpse of a Great Spotted Woodpecker on the path.

Our late September meeting was to Pennington flash.  The winter migrants are beginning to arrive.  There was a large flock of lapwings and several cormorants, both adults and juveniles with their striking pale stomach plumage, several shoveler, gadwall, teal & tufted ducks.  A couple of us got a brief flash of a kingfisher, but the highlight of the visit was a pair of water-rail, normally shy birds skulking in the reeds, in full view amongst the lapwing.  A finch, obligingly posed a few feet from us - but which none of us could identify, turned out to be a juvenile bullfinch.

This is my last report from the Bird Group.  I stepped down as leader from the end of September after two enjoyable years with a very pleasant group of friends.  The group will continue in a slightly different form, meeting once a month on the fourth Tuesday of the month, and with an emphasis on other types of wildlife as well as birds.                                                          Elizabeth

Mere Sands Wood and Marshside, Southport.

Meet:  Mere Sands Wood car park 10.00 am. Marshside after lunch.

October       27