Lunchtime peek at the sea

Very nice to see a bit of sunshine for a change but otherwise it was very quiet on the water. Two male and a female Eider were bobbing about asleep on the gentle swell fairly close in, a Cormorant flew past in the middle distance and right out on the horizon ther were small flocks of Common Scoter flying about. Nothing else to report and still very very cold in the slight breeze.

Someone has put up a few feeders in the gardens at work and they are attracting some attention from a small flock of House Sparrows which are always nice to see and there cheeky chirruping brightens up an otherwise quiet mid winter day. Thank you whoever you are. Three Oystercatchers were on the green at first light this morning and very sluggish there were too, maybe struggling to find enough food in the current frozen conditions, Dunnock also present mooching around the cover of the Gorse bushes.

Where to next? Pick up the new car.....wheyyy-heyyy...good job too because we've broken the old one; it has an electrical problem perhaps from fording the river the other day and is powerless.

In the meantime whether it is freezing cold or the sun is cracking the flags let us know what you have found in your outback.

Happy New Year to one and all

It happened - the safari manged to get a new camera in the sales...sadly funds wouldn't run to an slr but a decent Fuji compact was purchased off the web at a knock down price so hopefully the quality of the pictures from our adventures will improve...but I can't promise. The camera might have improved but not the photographer!

So far this year - not that there has been much of it - but early in the morning, before dawn, there do seem to be more Robins singing. Blackbird has also been added to the 2009 list but very little else. What will today bring? A lunch time peek at the sea is on the cards, the recent dense fog has been replaced by a thin winter sunshine today so fingers crossed there may be something out there to report later today.

The photo is of the now not so recent Bottle-nosed Dolphin taken by my mate Phil - it would be nice to see another one off the prom here this year along with a Basking Shark and some Storm Petrels...who knows what we will be able to show you in 2009...whatever it is it'll be good!

Where to next? Obviously a quick safari over the road to the beach.

In the meantime I hope all the safari's readers have a happy, peaceful and healthy New Year...but please let us know of your outback adventures and sightings...remember there is nothing ordinary about the familiar and commonplace.

Oh and by the way the safari is picking up a new luxury vehicle tomorrow morning...Betcha can't wait to find out what it is.

Got it but not quite ready yet.

Yes...the safari successfully completed the river crossing again yesterday and at last we managed to film it. But the river wasn't as deep as the other day and the water only washed up over the bonnet. I think the hard frost has locked up much of the water in the hills and so there is less water coming down the river. I'll post the film when it has been downloaded off my co-pilot's camera which was cleverly strapped to the bullbar on the Land Rover.

Crossing the river to the other side takes you into another world of windy lanes with high hedges, small fields and scattered copses. We soon came across a Buzzard looking realy nice in the crisp light of a cold winter's day.

At a favoured site the only wildlife of note was a superb view of a Nuthatch probing the bark for food. As we watched it found a couple of white grubs in the crevices.

We left this site by the 4x4 track, patiently waiting for a group of ramblers coming down the steep track on the opposite hillside of the ford. To get up the steep, wet slope with a film of ice over the loose rocks we would need full throttle, so best to wait until everyone was safely out of the way. The Disco rattled up with no problems, there was even power to spare.

Travelling a few miles to another site we decided to search for Roe Deer. Leaving the track and quietly entering the dense wood we came across a fair sized flock of Long Tailed Tits with two tiny Goldcrests with them. Roe Deer have excellent hearing and moving through wood over crisply frozen frozen ground with plenty of fallen leaves and dead twigs demanded all our tracking skills. Eventually we came across a couple of deer. Despite our best efforts they had heard us coming but all all on the safari got good if fleeting views, sadly to short for photographs - might have to set a hide up in the warmer months! A few yards further on we came across a third which could well have been one of the original two.

It is still December but one small Hawthorn sapling sported a recently sprouted bright green leaf. There is a reasonable selectionof fungi in the wood and the tree composition appears to be changing. The colonising Silver Birch and Poplar (see pic above with the diagnostic diagonal lenticels in the bark- also the abundance of small trees and dense understorey despite the deer) are coming to the end of their lives and being blown over or rotting off and there are a lot of small Ash and Hawthorn waiting to take over the canopy space when it becomes available. In this area we found a very obliging Treecreeper which we watched going about its business for several minutes.

I'll ask Jack of Lancashire Nature (see blog links on right) to identify these fungi - he's pretty knowledgable where as I'm not).

Along the river we eventually saw a fly past Dipper.

At the car park the Rangers have set up a feeding station and whilst enjoying a welcome hot coffee we had stunning views of two Jays, two Nuthatches and assorted tits and finches a Robin and a Reed Bunting.

With some daylight left we headed west to the plains and a site for Short Eared Owl. Only a few minutes after parking the Land Rover one appeared quuartering a rough field about 100 yards away - brilliant in the low afternoon sun. We learnt from other people there that we had somewhat disappointingly only just missed a Barn Owl. Some of the other grazed fields around held good numbers of Curlew, Lapwing, and/or Pink Footed Geese. With time getting short it was time to head back to the warmth of the fireside...a super safari with a good mix of wildlife, off road driving and adventure...

Where to next? Not sure yet but there will be great wildlife to be seen where-ever it is.

In the meantime let us know what you have found in your outback.

Missed!!

Christmas isn't Chrismas without a Robin; unfortunatley there was no snow up in the hills to really set this little fella off Christmas card style.

Here he is in all his digitally zoomed blurredness.

A short safari this afternoon with Frank the mudhound took us to the hills. Very little around in the woods. A small flock of Long Tailed Tits, no more than a handful of Robins, a single and lonely Coal Tit, somewhere overhead a Buzzard peeooo-ed and on the lake there was a small flock of Mallard. Scanning the woods and Rhododendron scrub (see leaves behind Robin) from the valley track revealed no Roe Deer but a fine male Goosander flew over. That was about it. Lots and lots and lots of four footed bird scarers (as Fleetwood Birder - see blog links on right - calls them)

On the way back we decided to do the river crossing in the Land Rover as it hadn't rained too much recently. A successful passage but still deep in the hole; water slooshed over the bonnet and right up and over the windscreen - right foot hard down and keep the power on and hope the engine doesn't run out of air - and relief as we climb out - will the new vehicle get a snorkel?

Good job the safari is getting a new vehicle as the current tore off a piece of the plastic underbumper to the sound of horrible scrunching noises climbing out the far side as it caught on the front wheel.

We were set to film the crossing but the approach is quite rough and my cameraman's finger came off the record button so you don't get us actually reaching the river! Oops - will have try again.

Spot the difference!

Where to next? Well back to the river crossing to see if we can lose the other half of the bumper. (Never realised there was that big rust hole hiding behind the plastic trim!)

In the meantime let us know what bits you have lost of your car in a river this Christmas holiday. Or is your Robin the same as ours. Everywhere us Brits have been we've called something vaguely reddish a Robin...so you must have one somewhere.

A Christmas short

The safari had a short trip out today before turkey and all the trimmings. More a case of getting out of the way while dinner was being prepared.

We found ourselves at Marton Mere nature reserve again. Unfortunately there were more dogs out than wildlife and the numpties above spent ages encouraging their mutts to jump into the wildlife ponds. I just hope they hadn't been in any of the nearby ponds that are contaminated with the invasive alien plants Crassula and/or Azolla otherwise the sterling efforts of the Nature Watch group will have been to no avail as it is almost impossible to eradicate these plants once they have taken hold. 'Ignorance is bliss' - so this lot must be very happy!




Over the mere itself the light was grotty and these are the best I can do with Photo Editor. Plenty of Common Gulls were on the water. A couple of Goldeneyes and a smattering of Tufted Ducks and Pochard but we couldn't see the recently reported female Ferruginous Duck - or is it some type of Aythya hybrid, no-one seems quite sure yet.

Down in the scrub the Long Eared Owls were disappointingly absent too. However there were a few Blackbirds about and the odd Fieldfare. Roll on the January sales and I can bag a bargain in the dslr camera with a bit of a telephoto lens line rather than rely on this little compact.

With the weather going to be cooling down again the few remaining apples are a vital food supply for the thrushes on the reserve.

At the reserve gate this male Kestrel come in from the west and in the still air decided to hunt from a perch high in a Poplar tree.

That was all we had time for - a turkey was beckoning.

Where to next? The weekend looks go for a safari but in which direction will we be heading?

In the meantime let us know what have you been seeing in your outback. Has any one in the USA seen real live backwoods Turkeys?

Possibly a safari tomorrow

Watch this space - there may be a safari tomorrow morning.

If not a very merry Christmas and a prosperous and peaceful New Year to you all.

Is any one out there from northern Iran? I always fancied a trip to the SE corner of the Caspian Sea at migration time...reckoned it could be a really good area to view visible raptor migration.