Dee Estuary

Pink-footed Goose 150 (flushed by dog walker from sands behind Little Eye, Hilbre at 9:45)
Pale-bellied Brent Goose 118 (Hilbre)
Dark-bellied Brent Goose 2 (Hilbre)
Red-breasted Merganser 1 (drake, Hilbre)
Purple Sandpiper 1

Twite 13 (Thurstaston Shore)
Peregrine 1 (Thurstaston Shore)
Oystercatcher, Knot, Black-tailed Godwit, Redshank 15,000+ (Thurstaston Shore)
Pintail 600+ (Thurstaston Shore)

Peregrine 1 (Burton Marsh)
Short-eared Owl 1 (Burton Marsh)
Bewick's Swan 14 (Burton Marsh)

Whooper Swan 31 (Inner Marsh Farm)

Another tremendous visit to Hilbre.

It was a gloriously sunny morning, though there was a stiff, cold wind.As I approached Little Eye at about 9:30, a flock of about 150 geese went up from the sands behind the island. At first I thought that they were the wintering Brents, but such thoughts were immediatly dispelled because the call was clearly Pink-foot. The light was perfect, and they flew right in front of me and then away north towards Southport. I've never seen Pinks at Hilbre before, and presumably these were Norfolk birds returning north to Lancashire. A wonderfully atmospheric sight.

On the main island, there were about 120 Brent Geese, mainly Pale-bellied, but there were at least two Dark-bellied. The usual 1st winter Shag was sitting on the rocks, but the real surprise was a wonderful drake Red-breasted Merganser which swam past the north tip of the island. A genuinely stunning bird, green head with a scarlet red bill and eye, an orange breast and a body / upperparts which was a subtle combination of grey, black and white. And such a wild, reptilian looking bird. I really could imagine that this was descended from dinnosaurs! Is there a more beautiful bird on the British list?

After leaving the island, I decided to head south down the Dee. My first stop was Thurstaston shore, near the Wirral country park visitor centre. It took me a while to get onto the flock of 13 Twite which have been hanging around Tinkers Dell steps, but the wait was worth it, with thousands on waders, and hundreds of Pintail on the estaury, and a Peregrine periodically spooking the lot. It's difficult to say exactly how many waders there were of each species, but there must have been 15,000 birds in total, mainly Oystercatchers, but also thousands of Knot and at least 1000 Black-tailed Godwits.

The Pintail were magnificent, hundreds of them hauled out on the bank, as I watched, the tide was coming in, and was forcing them to fly, a real spectacular sight!

Next I moved down to Burton Marsh. Here I saw a magnificent adult Peregrine powering its way across the marsh, until suddenly a Short-eared Owl rose from the ground and made the Peregrine swerve away. The falcon rose high, and then swooped at the Owl, which narrowly avoided its assailant. Also here, a flock of 14 Bewick's Swans.

Finally, I ended the day at the RSPB reserve, Inner Marsh Farm. It was fairly quiet, I even had the hide to myself, but just as I was about to leave a flock of 31 Whooper Swans flew in and landed. They all raised their heads high, then lowered them to drink some water, then raised them again. They did this continoulsy for about 5 minutes, before they relaxed and started preening. The end of an excellent day!