Chiffchaff in the garden this morning, it spent awhile gleaning insects of my patio rose bushes, a nice surprise. Shortly after a Wren was doing same.

Not sure what it says about my rose bushes!

The set-aside by the sewage works still had at least 400 Chaffinch and a few Bramblings today and a flock of 22 Stock Doves in the nearby field.

09:23 400+ Pink-footed Geese flew due E low over Culcheth. Noisy !

A walk onto farmland north of Withington Avenue producing a restless mixed flock of finches, buntings & sparrows which included:

Tree Sparrow - 40+
House Sparrow - 20
Chaffinch - 40+
Brambling - 1
Yellowhammer - 4 (1m/3f)
Reed Bunting - 15

Pink footed Geese - 60 heading low to NE

Working in the garden this afternoon was certainly worthwhile if for no other reason than watching skeins of geese passing overhead between 2 - 3pm!

An impressive 1600 Pink footed Geese flew east in flocks varying between 50 & 250 in size. And the total is an undercount as I heard but could not see at least 2 other skeins heading in the same direction to the south of me during that time.

Just on the move are harbingers of bad weather to come??

Pink footed Geese - 250 heading west at 9.15am, only just visible through the mist.

15:15 probable Red Kite drifting west

Viewed from moving vehicle in heavy traffic, but tail, wing shape & jizz seemed good. "Not the best view"

Pink footed geese - 450 in 2 skeins (200 & 250) heading south to north earlier.

There's a regular movement of ca200 geese heading east in the morning and then back west in late afternoon at the moment.

Pink footed geese - 3 skeins totaling 200 flew low to the west this morning with further birds heard but not seen heading out east at the same time

Possible Marsh Harrier circling very high over N Culcheth (y'day): wings looked too long & wrong shape for Buzzard, too distant to be sure though

-- Edited by John Watson on Thursday 8th of September 2016 09:59:32 AM

Originally posted today by Rob Smith:

Pink footed geese - 135 in two skeins (60 & 75) flew east around 9.30am this morning

1+ Redwing feeding in my garden y'day eve

Flock (family ?) of ~6 swift drifted south over village

20+ Corn Buntings in bushes on top of banking behind Hanging Birch Farm on Weds at dusk

1 Corn Bunting on wires on Holcroft Lane c.12.50pm today.

Fields around franks farm/silver lane pools

50 swifts 2 sedge warbler 1 garden warbler 3 willow warbler 5 whitethroat 30 swallows 10 house martin 2 meadow pipit skylark buzzard kestrel 5 yellowhammer 3 reed bunting 2 grey partridge(more heard) 1 corn bunting 3 stock dove 1 little owl and 1 barn owl hunting to within 10 feet.

Had a look over Holcroft Moss (the one marked as such on an OS map rather than the fields around Franks Farm) this evening. I was hoping for an owl or two but was disappointed. Several buzzards, two grey partridge, lots of roosting woodpigeon then, as darkness gathered, seven woodcock.

Wander round Holcroft Moss this morning

42 Grey Partridges (11, 9, 8, 7 & 7)
1 Corn Bunting
2 Jays
14 Long-tailed Tits
1 Buzzard
1 Sparrowhawk

At Holcroft Hall Farm

1 Corn Bunting
7 Golden Plovers
130+ Lapwings

Another visit to Holcroft Moss (Franks' Farm), with Dave Steel and Les Jones, to check on the impact of the Stewardship scheme on wintering birds. At the moment this area offers some of the best (if not the best!) arable birding in the area. There are plenty of weedy stubbles and a 20 - 30 acre area of set-aside crop, which is acting as a magnet for feeding buntings and finches. The weedy fields are full of Skylarks (with 320 counted), with Meadow Pipits (67 counted) also present. Fifty Lapwings, 375 Starlings, 36 Fieldfare, 3 Common Buzzards, 2 Sparrowhawks, 24 Grey Partridge, 16 Blackbirds, 2 Kestrels, 2 Song Thrushes, 16 Goldfinches, 850 Wood Pigeons, 300 Jackdaws and 58 Stock Doves were some of the commoner species present.

As we approached the set-aside area we saw the typical dumpy out-line of a group of Corn Buntings in a couple of bare bushes. We counted 17, which is excellent, as we've been struggling to find any on the rest of the local arable mosses. The next minute the sky was full of birds as a Peregrine passed over the set-aside crop - several hundred Linnets, scores of Skylarks and Buntings were whirling among the hundreds of corvids. The numbers of buntings feeding in the crop was difficult to estimate but we ended up with a conservative 250 Reed Buntings and 75 Yellowhammers. Absolutely spectacular! As a last note of interest a Roe Deer emerged from the crop, very unconcerned about us, and slowly wandered away.

Cheers David

22 Corn Buntings Holcroft Lane this evening

Four yellow wagtails around the driveway to Franks Farm on Holcroft Lane at 6.10am this morning, with at least one more unseen bird calling to the west (probably around the entrance to the field that's blocked off by a felled tree). Also in the area were two corn buntings and a pair of grey partridge.

50+ Golden Plover still nr Franks farm but most of plover flock hidden from view

At least 22 Golden Plovers with 350+ Lapwings in fields in front of Holcroft Hall farm this morning. Part of flock obscured so there could have been more.

Flock of at least 31 Corn Buntings on Holcroft Lane this morning. They were in trees approx 100 yds south from Hanging Birch Farm - they then flew onto the moss. Also a drake Goosander flew over.