Trip reports
Moor Green Nature Reserve - by Geoff Allan
Wednesday, 10 December 2008
I made the mistake of leaving a little early (sorry Dennis) I blame Mick for giving me false info. We got there on our own at just after 9.00 am and that included getting lost. The others duly arrived at the appointed time of 10.00 am. This time again a very good turnout of eight people. As a sign of the weather of late the lakes were mostly frozen, the river was however free running. While we were waiting for the party to muster Dennis and I had blue and great tit, great spotted woodpecker, lapwings standing on the ice and a few duck on what little open water there was. As it was getting close to ten we returned to the car park to pick up the rest of the group. Dave Campbell assisted me in leading this meet as he is a member of Moor Green and knows it better than me. First stop was at the new feeding station by the first hide this gave us blue and great tit again, greenfinch and chaffinch. Best of all a pair of lesser redpolls. We moved off further down the path to the new screen which gave us fantastic views of a skating rink. We moved off to the river turned left and followed the river until we came to the lake where we got our first sightings of goosander, we moved off to the hide Dave C let us in through the door by remembering the combination. Here we had good views of mallard, tufted duck, pochard, wigeon and teal. Then came our first good views of a male goosander and seven females. We also had a couple of roe deer on the far bank. We left the hide at about midday on the way back down the track we picked up another five lesser redpolls. We got back to the car park at about 1.00 pm at this point some people decided to call it a day. The rest of us went along to the other side overlooking the gravel pits and picked up a couple of Egyptian and one Canada goose. The other side did not add to much more to the count so it was decided to head back towards the car park. This time we called into the first hide where we had nine male goosander and one female, coming out of the hide we had a female reed bunting at the feeding station. When we got back to the car park one of the group who had not joined us for the second part had managed to pick up a redwing and five common snipe. In the fields by the car park we picked up four or five song thrushes. This ended a good day out, thanks to all who turned out. The total for the day 44 species.
Geoff A