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| Snow Bunting -Rhodie Blythe |
Having heard on the Tyno
grapevine that there was a Grey Phalarope at Gronant and that the Snow Bunting
was still around the New Brighton area, Ann and I decided to journey to Wild Wales. We did ask a few others if they wished to
join us, sadly all had other commitments!
Well, what a lovely day we had,
the sun shone and we arrived at Gronant to see several people with extremely
large scopes looking at the lake. We
then spotted the Grey Phalarope, spinning dementedly and pecking furiously at
the water.
There was obviously lots of
lovely food around for this very pretty bird.
En route to the beach we saw a
Little Egret. We ventured down to the
beach to be greeted by a very large colony of Cormorants sitting on the shore
line. We heard a skylark, saw Linnets
and of course a lovely array of Black Headed Gulls, Lesser Black Backed Gulls
and a Great Black Backed Gull. A Grey
Heron flew over head. Oyster Catchers
were looking very smart and close to them Ann spotted Ringed Plover, dashing
about looking for food.
After a further look at the Grey
Phalarope we decided that Point of Ayr was just too close to pass, so we had a
wander down there. The new screen hide
is very smart but it does have a roof!!
Sitting eating our butties a Redshank came close by followed by a Little
Egret, and then a Curlew. We did have a
lovely view of them. Soon a large flock
of Lapwing came across. Ann spotted Shelduck in the distance and
Shelduck Tours was reinstated!! We also
saw House Sparrows, a Skylark, Long Tailed Tits, a very striking Robin and a
dear little – very noisy – Wren.
Having eaten our lunch it was
decided that perhaps the Snow Bunting would be the icing on our delicious cake,
so off we went to New Brighton – Peaty would have been proud of our map reading
abilities! We walked along the sea wall
seeing the usual gulls etc., then Ann spotted some Turnstone running along in
the strong wind – but still no Snow Bunting.
Within sight of the car and almost despairing, we trudged across the
field when Ann said is that a Sparrow?
No, to our delight it was the Snow Bunting, having a seed/insectfest
protected by the car park wall. We
watched it for ages, revelling in its antics, as it sat down to feed, stood up,
turning this way and that, almost showing off for us, the audience. It has such lovely colouring with the edge of
the tail highlighted in white and, of course, the amazing beak.
Back to Liverpool and home just
as the weather turned wet but what a lovely happy day we had.
Rhodie
