30 Sep 22

Priorslee Lake and The Flash

6.0°C > 8.0°C: Fog / mist lifting to low overcast after 09:30. Increasing SSE breeze. Very poor / poor visibility.

Sunrise: 07:09 BST

* = a photo from today

Priorslee Lake: 05:45 – 09:00

(210th visit of the year)

Poor visibility hampered all sighting which are best-efforts.

Bird notes:
- The 15 fly-over unidentified large gulls could well have dropped in. I simply could not see even half-way across the water at the time.

Birds noted flying over here:
- c.15 Wood Pigeons
- 15 unidentified large gulls
Everything else lost in the mist.

Hirundines etc. noted:

None

Warblers noted:
- 1 Cetti's Warbler: in song in the north-east area
- 5 Chiffchaffs: no song heard

Counts from the lake area:
- 2 + 4 (1 brood) Mute Swans
- 4 (2♂) Gadwall
- 6 (4♂) Mallard
- 7 (2?) Tufted Duck
- 11 Moorhens
- Coots not counted
- no Little Grebes
- *Great Crested Grebes not counted
- *>55 Black-headed Gulls
- 3 Herring Gulls
- 34 Lesser Black-backed Gulls

Noted on / around dew-covered street lamp poles pre-dawn:
- 1 midge
- *two species of fly
- 1 springtail Pogonognathellus longicornis-type
- *2 probably European Ground Beetles (Nebria brevicollis)
- 1 Leiobunum blackwalli harvestman
- 2 Paroligolophus agrestis harvestman

Noted later:
- *Field Mushrooms (Agaricus campestris)
- *different Agaricaceae fungi
- Grey Squirrel

All a bit misty today. An adult Great Crested Grebe with food for one of its offspring.

And here is the youngster chomping on the hapless and hopefully dead fish.

An adult Black-headed Gull was one of the few birds that came close-enough to photograph.

Did I mention the early dew? I probably could not identify the fly anyway.

There were two of these ground beetles on one of the street lamp poles before dawn. I have SEEK, a smart phone app. from National Geographic. That suggested European Ground Beetle (Nebria brevicollis). There are many very similar ground beetles so I think this must be a provisional identification.

Perhaps a better view of the same specimen?

I found a few of these Field Mushrooms (Agaricus campestris) growing in the grass above the dam.

Also in the grass were these fungi. The SEEK app. suggested that they were from the same Agaricaceae family. The app. is not able to go further and neither am I.

(Ed Wilson)

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The Flash: 09:05 – 10:00

(203rd visit of the year)

Visibility was gradually improving. Eventually it was just about good enough to see most things.

Bird notes:
- I did not find the third adult Mute Swan though an earlier conversation with one of the fishermen suggested it was still present.
- The same fishermen opined that many of the Coots had been forced to leave as there is little weed for them to eat. This probably also explains the lower than usual (for this date) totals of Tufted Duck.
- He also reported that a group of 12 Cormorants had been fishing as a team in the water earlier but that many had left. I only noted two.

Birds noted flying over here:

None

Warblers noted:
- 1 Chiffchaff: no song

Noted on / around the water
- 21 Canada Geese
- 2 + 4 (1 brood) Mute Swans
- 38 (23♂) Mallard
- 1 (1♂) all-white duck (Aylesbury Duck)
- 19 (2?♂) Tufted Duck
- 19 Moorhens
- 19 Coots
- 3 Great Crested Grebes
- 5 Black-headed Gulls: two of these first winter birds
- 2 Cormorants: but see notes
- 1 Grey Heron

On / around the street lamp poles or later:

Nothing noted

Carrion Crow is not a species that I photograph very often. Like most members of the family they are very aware of their surroundings and tend to be camera-shy as a result. I was using the car as a hide and this bird approached some food that had been left for the ducks and the Moorhens. Carrion Crows are rarely as all-black as they seem at first glance. There are usually a few white or grey feathers.

A side view showing the bill with feathering extending along the top of the upper mandible. The bill shape is in stark contrast to that of the similar-sized Rook which has a conical bill with bare skin at the base, allowing it to dig in to grass to find its favourite food – leather jackets, the larvae of crane flies.

(Ed Wilson)

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In the Priorslee Avenue tunnel:

- 1 Tipula paludosa cranefly
- 3 owl midges Psychodidae sp.
- 17 other midges of various sizes
- 4 White-legged Snake Millipedes (Tachypodoiulus niger)

(Ed Wilson)

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NOTE

Here are few images from the visit I made yesterday to the RSPB Reserve at Burton Mere on the Wirral.

This trio of waders is asleep so are not too easy to identify, especially with nothing to give an idea of size. Standing up to their bellies in the water means it is impossible to judge the length and colour of the legs as these are mostly hidden. They are a trio of Greenshank. a medium-sized wader looking, in winter, rather grey. The top of one leg on the middle bird is just visible and is clearly not red as it would be on either (Common) Redshank or Spotted Redshank.

Talking of Spotted Redshank: here is one. At Burton many of the hides look South, in to the light, so it is difficult to see colours. Features that separate this species from (Common) Redshank in winter are a longer and thinner bill and a white streak between the base of the bill and the front of the eye. In summer this species is black with white spots, hence its name. Behind it is a sleeping Eurasian Teal. There were hundreds of these, mostly asleep, probably resting after a long post-breeding flight from northern Norway or points East.

The weather was not especially sunny so there were only a few insects about. I did see my first Small Copper butterfly (Lycaena phlaeas) this year.

 I struggle to separate the three species of hawker dragonflies. The RSPB warden pointed the SEEK app. on his mobile phone at this photo on my camera's screen. The app. pronounced it to be a male Migrant Hawker (Aeshna mixta). I double-checked against Jim Almond's excellent "Dragonflies and Damselflies of Shropshire" web pages Here.

I noticed this unusual-looking fly on the inside of the window of the RSPB's reception centre. The SEEK app. suggested it is a species of soldier fly. Reference to the NatureSpot web site indicates it might be a Twin-spot Centurion (Sargus bipunctatus). The 'twin spots' are small white spots on the frons (the middle part of the face on flies) which cannot be seen in my photo to confirm that identification.

(Ed Wilson)