The Merry Springers Show

I have been out plenty over the last week - but although I have been in the great outdoors at least a couple of times per day I have had a couple of deranged Springer Spaniels in tow.

As one can imagine, this is not very conducive to good birding. Nevertheless, I must have walked the entire Flintshire side of the Dee Estuary in segments over the last week in between sitting and home writing sarcastic comments about the Royal Society for Picnics and Barbeques (Okay, enough is enough! It’s being on the social and trying to live on 65 quid a week – it makes you bitter!!!)

Anyways, my best ‘discovery’ has been the old colliery pools and surrounding area that lie past Ground Zero at the Point of Ayr.

Until a few weeks ago, I had never walked in this section, but it is incredible habitat – a mixture of pools (the middle one pictured above), wet grassland and scrub.

Over a few visits I have clocked Little Grebe, Greenshank, Kingfisher, Kestrel, Wheatear, a pair of juvenile Ravens and a probable Lapland Bunting, I say ‘probable’ as I’ve never seen one for sure and have no clue what their call sounds like. Incidentally, if anybody knows where I can get a sound file of the call, then can you please let me know?

The Lappy was in quite an interesting area as it happens – right at the point where the seawall that passes behind the pools reaches the railway wall at the western end of Ffynnongroyw beach. For some reason part seems to hold a good concentration of migrant passerines – on every occasion I have walked this far there has always been good numbers of birds.

Other interesting observations this week have been a good count of over ten Great Crested Grebes on the river channel of Bagillt Marsh (they seem to have vanished from around Connah’s Quay), a few hundred Golden Plover flying north along the shoreline the same evening and quite a few sightings of Ringed Plover too between Mostyn and Flint.

All this walking along the coast then gave me an idea: why not walk the entire length from Prestatyn to Flint and then get the train back. What the heck - buy an open return and do it both ways!

Until later.