MERSEY MUD MATTERS

QUESTION: How many calories are there in one cubic metre of lovely Mersey mud?

ANSWER: 4160, the same number of calories as 16 Mars bars. Yum! No wonder thousands of birds are willing to fly all the way from the Arctic to feed here.

The Mersey Estuary is an amazing place. It’s been vital for the economic prosperity for the area, an iconic part of our history and always stunning for wildlife. It’s a European Special Protection Area ( SPA ), a designated Ramsar site, and one of the four nationally designated Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI’s)

 http://www.ukmpas.org/mapper.php

Each autumn, birds arrive on the Mersey Estuary all the way from the Arctic . The estuary is a vital link in the chain of migration that sustains many birds through the winter. They choose the estuary as their winter quarters because it’s a sheltered site with an abundance of food. And it’s not just wintering species who love it on the Mersey . The estuary is also a popular and important breeding ground for skylarks and redshanks, as well as colonies of gulls.

Together with Morecambe Bay , and the Rivesr Ribble and Dee estuaries, the Mersey forms part of Europe ’s most important wetlands network for wintering and passage birds, hosting almost a million every year

Who feeds here?

49,000 Dunlin, 1,600 Curlew, 3,000 Teal, 10,000 Widgeon, 10,000 Shelduck, 11,000 Black Tailed Godwit, 5,5000 Redshank, 10,000 Lapwings, 2,500 Golden Plover and 1,300 Grey Plover.(approx figures,Wetland Bird Survey 2000-01)

A site is considered to be of international importance for any species of bird if it supports more than 1 per cent of the European population. The Mersey Estuary is internationally important for three species of duck and four species of wading bird and so qualifies as a Special Protection Area, a status reserved for only the most important bird sites in Europe. It also qualifies as a Ramsar site; a wetland of international importance. This recognises wetlands as vital links in a chain where migratory birds can stop and refuel en route between their breeding and wintering grounds. To be considered nationally important, a site must regularly support more than 1 per cent of the UK population of any species.

Turnstone

Shelduck

Curlew

Dunlin

RSPB's Tim Melling tells us more about Important Bird Populations on the Mersey Estuary

http://www.merseybasin.org.uk/archive/assets/173/original/Flocking_To_The_Mersey.pdf

*****For up to date sightings and bird counts go to

https://www.facebook.com/pg/Mersey-Estuary-WeBS-216178248450013/about/

"April 2017 Mersey WeBS Count

Two things stand out this month: a new record for black-tailed godwit with 3,852 beating the previous record of 3,304 and our third record of green-winged teal found at Manisty by Paul."

Get involved:

https://www.bto.org/volunteer-surveys/webs

The River Mersey supports a typical estuarine fauna. Invertebrates include such species as pink and green ragworm, white catworm,  lugworm in sandy foreshores, shore crabs, small Hydrobia snails and shrimps  (as well as sand gobies) in small pools, mussels, prawns, sea anemone in rock pools along Egremont shore, Korean sea squirts and common jellyfish in some of the docks whilst damselfly, dragonfly and caddisflies are found further up river.

Plant Species occurring on the salt marsh  include, for example, sea couch, common salt marsh grass, halberd-leaved orache, sea aster, scurvy grass, annual sea-blite, sea plantain, sea milkwort and sea clubrush.

Barnacle

Caddis fly

Shore crab

Sand Goby

Clam

Hydrobia snail

Lugworm

Ragworm

Mussels

Water quality improvements now means the Mersey supports a wide range of fish species including Salmon, Trout, Lamprey and Dace. The increase in numbers of fish in the river has encouraged a number of other animals to return to the estuary. These include porpoises, grey seas and even octopus!

Cheshire fire and rescue with porpoise

http://www.thefriendsofpickeringspasture.org.uk/stranded-porpoise.html

The marshland was alive with the sound of ping!

Teal - with 'Bill ring'

Well maybe not a lot of pinging but we found the beardies!  Another beautiful day dawned for our trip, a full minibus and our bake off champion Ann had made us a another strudel cake for the journey

Blacktoft away team

Blacktoft is the largest intertidal reedbed in England and an important wildlife area in the Humber estuary. 474 acres of tidal reedbeds, saltmarsh, mudflats and brackish lagoons. The reserve itself is easy to get round ad its linear, 3 hides to the left of the reception hide first. Townend and Singleton, 3 to the right Xerox, Marshland and Ousefleet.

On arrival at the reserve were greeted by small toadlets on the path, and a stationary hare on the adjacent field. The tree sparrows were on good form, hanging onto the reserves seed feeders. 

Goldfinch on thistle

A charm of goldfinches were picking over  the thistle heads in front of the reception hide, but alas no kingfisher.

We were advised by the warden the best place to see the beardies was the Townend  hide,

View from Townend Hide

so we went straight there,  initial birds noted on the mud and around the reed beds were blue tits, pied wagtails, reed warblers, dunnock, reed bunting  stock dove and moorhens . Swallows swooped over the waters. The red arrows display team soared over head as if to announce the arrival of the beardies, as shortly after they started to flit around the bottom of the reed beds on the left. 

Bearded tit

Up to half a dozen were observed; closest view was when a couple of adventurous birds came onto the mud for a drink, lovely.  

Our first views of marsh harrier followed; close enough to see its cream head plumage.

Marsh Harrier

Mission accomplished we moved onto the other hides, at the Marshland/Xerox hides we were treated to a further visits from a marsh harrier, joined later by a buzzard.   Other birds on the waters, reedbeds, around the island muddy fringes were lapwing, pintail, little grebe,

Pristine ruff

widgeon, mallard, gadwall, shoveller, gt created grebe, wood pigeon,  snipe, redshank, spotted redshank, starlings, ruff and well spotted ‘Manu’ a water rail .

Butterflies and dragonflies roamed the reserve, speckled wood, green veined white, small white, red admiral, tortoiseshell, emperor and migrant hawkers dragonflies

 

Migrant hawker female 

At the Ouse fleet hide we added golden plover to our list and our first gulls, common, herring, lesser and greater black back.

A little excitement was the observation of a teal with a ’bill ring' which were told identified the bird had been ringed in the Camargue, France http://www.oncfs.gouv.fr/IMG/article_PDF/rubrique_r141.pdf

I must mention the Konik,  these ponies  graze their way through the reserve’s reedbed,

Konik ponies

opening up new pools and channels that attract fish and amphibians, which in turn, have provided a banquet for the reserve’s rare and secretive bitterns. No bitterns today but we weren't disappointed.

  

We ended the day with Chris and Arnie showing us the best way of getting over a barrier, I’ll let you decide … 

Steeplechaser Chris

Steady Eddie Arnie

Laura