BIRDING THE LUNE ESTUARY THE FOREST OF BOWLAND AND BEYOND......................................................MEDITTERANEAN GULLS CONDER POOL PETE WOODRUFF

Tuesday 26 July 2016

....And A Pleasant Plover Surprise.


Avocet. Pete Woodruff.

This photograph was taken yesterday just fourteen days after the top one showing a good healthy growth of the lone surviving Conder Pool Avocet, seen with an adult still seeing everything off coming close to the young bird which is on the verge of fledging in the next few days.

Also noted on the pool, 2 Little Grebe, up to 120 Lapwing and 5 Redshank. In the creeks, 5 Little Egret were feeding in a close group, with 14 Common Sandpiper and 4 Greenshank between here and down the Conder channel. Three Whitethroat were seen as an adult and two juvenile in an area I've checked all summer and neither heard nor seen them there until today. 

On the Lune Estuary, gull numbers were very low, and very few notable wader numbers, though the Dunlin and Redshank were driven close to the bowling green by the incoming tide, 2 Greenshank may have been from Conder Green, 2 Turnstone are at best scarce here, a single Bar-tailed Godwit, a Great-crested Grebe, and a fishing adult Common Tern seen.   

Common Tern. Glasson Canal Basin. Pete Woodruff.

This adult Common Tern was on the canal basin after I left the Lune Estuary, this could have been the same estuary bird.

Up to high tide, Plover Scar was quiet, though if I said there was up to 200 waders on there it would sound like a contradiction, with c.100 Oystercatcher, 80 Dunlin, 18 Redshank, 6 Ringed Plover, and a single Knot seen.

A Pleasant Plover Surprise.

Dunlin. Cockersand. Pete Woodruff.

These Dunlin were two of six on the cobbled slipway below the kissing-gate by Cockersand Abbey escaping the high tide. It was here I had my pleasant plover surprise, when I heard the call of an adult bird. It hadn't looked good last Thursday when I saw just one chick from three being called to by the parent bird as it scuttled along and away from Plover Scar to escape the tide. So it was excellent that I saw all three young Ringed Plover today in the same area as last week, fit and well with the growth of a week since I first found them on 18 July.

3 comments:

  1. Nice to hear some good news Pete. A good list of birds there.

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  2. Delighted to hear of the good news on your remaining Avocet chick, and the three Ringed Plover chicks, Pete. I wish them all long and healthy lives.

    Best wishes - - - Richard

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  3. Marc/Richard....Yes, good news for the Avocets, it's looking like a success story on Conder Pool for them, and looking better for the Ringed Plovers when it wasn't all that clever the last time I saw these birds at Cockersand.

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