The Naturalists' Notebook

It was another very hot day, perhaps not the best day for going out in the sun and sand, but there was a refreshing breeze off the sea, so it only got to 25°C (77°F).  We arrived at Waterloo later than expected (see travel details below).

Crowds of birds on the small Boating Lake as usual. Black-headed Gulls, half a dozen Mute Swans, many juvenile Herring Gulls, one Lesser Black-backed Gull, Coots and Canada Geese. One Swallow flew over. In the far distance was a female duck with eight little ducklings. She wasn’t a Mallard, her plumage was too dark for that, and she had a light beak. The tiny black fluffy ducklings were all diving for their food like pros. (Mallards don’t dive). She was a Tufted Duck I think, and with that white edge at the base of her beak, perhaps she has a Scaup in her ancestry.

A patch of rough grass and Creeping Thistle at the seaward end of the road separating Crescent and Adelaide Gardens was alive with butterflies and day-flying moths. There were Gatekeepers, a Six-spot Burnet Moth, and something medium-sized, all dark brown or black, which just wouldn’t sit still for a second. Was it a Chimney Sweeper moth Odezia atrata? That is day-flying, all black, said to like bright sunshine and rarely settles in one place. If so, it’s a new one on me. The only butterfly I was able to catch was this Meadow Brown.

The Buddleia in Adelaide Gardens had the bigger butterflies, Comma, and this lovely Peacock.

Later, also on a Buddleia, a splendid Red Admiral.

After lunch, we wandered northwards into Beach Lawn Garden to look in the pond, hoping to see those rare tiny creatures, the Small Red-eyed Damselfly. They were reported here a few years ago, but only seem to have lasted one summer. But we did see a mating pair of dragonflies, probably Common Darters. The male (at the front) was red and was clasping the female near the back of her head. She was fawny-yellow. He was swooping her down so her tail repeatedly touched the water to lay her (and his) eggs.

Flitting around the reeds were some blue Hawker-type dragonflies which didn’t sit still, but the star creature of the day was this male Emperor Dragonfly.

Some little girls were pond-dipping with nets and buckets. I asked if I could take a picture into one of the buckets, which they allowed, and found three nearly-grown tadpoles with arms and legs forming, but which also still had protruding gills. That eliminates frogs and toads and makes them Newt tadpoles. I have no idea which species.

We walked along the beach briefly. It was hard going over the sandy dune hills, but we got there and said hello to one of the Iron Men. They had celebrated their 20th anniversary on the previous day.

In the dunes, we found specialist plants everywhere. Marram grass, Ragwort, great stands of Evening Primrose, Sea Holly and Sea Rocket.

On the was back we looked again for the Tuftie mother and her eight little ones, but they had disappeared. But now there was a Mallard mother with a flotilla of six ducklings.

Public transport details: We intended to get the train from Central at 10.17, but it flagged up as cancelled. Staff said “shortage of trains”. When the 10.32 was also cancelled we gave up and went for a bus. Perhaps some drivers had called in sick to go to the Orange Lodge Parades in the city centre. Bus 53 from Queen Square at 10.50, arriving Waterloo Station at 11.35. Bus back from Waterloo at about 2.30, but I can walk home from there.
Next week depends on the weather, so meet Queen Square at 10 am and we will decide then.

Anyone is welcome to come out with the Sunday Group. It is not strictly part of the MNA, although it has several overlapping members. We go out by public transport to local parks, woods and nature reserves all over Merseyside, and occasionally further afield. We are mostly pensioners, so the day is free on our bus passes, and we enjoy fresh air, a laugh and a joke, a slow amble in pleasant surroundings and sometimes we even look at the wildlife!
If you want to join a Sunday Group walk, pack lunch, a flask, waterproofs, binoculars if you have them, a waterproof pad to sit on if we have to have lunch on the grass or a wet bench (A garden kneeler? A newspaper in a plastic bag?), and wear stout shoes or walking boots. We are usually back in Liverpool City Centre by 3pm at the latest.
If you are interested in the wildlife of the north-west of England and would like to join the walks and coach trips run by the Merseyside Naturalists’ Association, see the main MNA website www.mnapage.info for details of our programme and how to join us.

We entered the park at the southern side and decided to keep to the cooler, wooded area along the Allerton Road edge. A Song Thrush was calling.  The edges of the woodland have been left unmown, and we spotted both Meadow Brown and Small Skipper butterflies in that area, which was thick with Meadowsweet.

They have also planted many new young trees there. We spotted Tibetan Cherry, Prunus serrula, with its lovely mahogany-coloured bark;  Golden Grey Alder, Alnus incana ‘Aurea’; a Katsura, Cercidiphyllum japonica. We searched in vain for the young Golden Rain tree reported in this area, but did see a young Mulberry Morus nigra, perhaps intended as a replacement for the old one between the lake and the Mansion House, which appears to be dying.

Most birds were hiding away, with only Magpies and Wood Pigeons on the lawns and Mallards and Moorhen on the lake. One distant white duck had a mixed brood of ducklings, some yellow, some brown. Other trees that we stopped to examine included a young Plane tree, which we thought might be an unusual variant, but it was just the ordinary London Plane Platanus x hispanica. We had never seen a young one before! A young Judas tree, still in its cage and leaning alarmingly, had produced a huge crop of pea-type seed pods.

A delicate Japanese Maple had produced its “helicopter” seeds, in bunches hanging below the leaves.

As well as this year’s profusion of young seeds and nuts, high summer is also a time for parasites.  The leaves of the Horse Chestnuts are starting to show their infestations of Horse Chestnut Leaf Miner. They are the caterpillars of the tiny moth Cameraria ohridella. New to the UK, they were first seen in 2002. I first saw it locally in Reynolds Park in 2014.

A young oak tree bore Marble galls, about the size of an old-fashioned glass “ollie”. Each contains a single female larva of the wasp Andricus kollari.

The large Walnut tree at the entrance of the flower garden was producing many young walnuts, but some lower leaves were marked by the blisters of the Walnut Leaf Gall Mite, Aceria erinea. The mites live in the corresponding depression on the underside of the leaf.

Along the wall of the toilet block, opposite the Japanese garden, the roots of the Ivy support a parasitic plant called Ivy Broomrape, Orobanche hederae. It is entirely dependent on the Ivy, having no chlorophyll of its own. It is commoner in southern England and Wales, but there is a cluster of reports in the Merseyside area, and it isn’t often seen further north than here.

In the trees over the Japanese garden, a Blackbird was calling repeatedly, possibly to its nest or mate as an announcement that food was on the way. But it had food in its beak. How did it call when its mouth was full?

Public transport details: Bus 86A from Elliot Street at 10.04, arriving Mather Avenue / Ballantrae Road at 10.35. Returned on bus 86A from Mather Avenue / Storrsdale Road at 2.35, arriving city centre at 3.10.
No walk next week. On 13th July we plan to go to Crosby seafront, meeting 10 am at Central Station.

We arrived early, finding not much life stirring, just the sound of the church bells in the distance. It was still warm, but with a brisk wind and thunder showers expected later.

Today’s draw was an exhibition of bird art in the Lady Lever Gallery, but we looked around the village on the way there.  On the Bath Street green north of The Dell is this wonderfully strange Sphinx polar sundial, said to have originally been put up for the Relief of Mafeking in 1900 and restored for the Millennium in 2000.

We were hoping to get close enough to the flowers of the Tulip trees in the Dell to touch or smell them, but they were all out of reach. There were also quite a lot of buds of flowers yet to come, and also developing cones of earlier flowers that have gone over. It must flower sequentially, all through the summer, and leave bare winter trees full of hundreds of cones. If they all flowered simultaneously in the summer, wouldn’t that be a sight!

There are Lime tree avenues all over Port Sunlight, with their flowers and bracts hanging daintily below the branches.

Christ Church United Reform Church has some Interesting old trees in the churchyard. We had missed the flowering of the Indian Bean tree, sadly, but we lingered over the broken (but sprouting) trunk of a massive old Cherry tree. It was 202 cm in girth (79½ inches). The Cheshire champion native cherry trees (Prunus avium) are about 350 cm girth, at Cholmondeley Castle and Tatton Park, but this one is still quite large in comparison. The church was built 1902-4, so was this churchyard tree planted then and is it only 120 years old? Or was it there before the church was built?

A young Rowan tree was already showing its clusters of berries, although still only greeny-brown.

A Weeping Ash was looking very threadbare and sick. Does it have Ash dieback disease?

A shrub by the gate attracted our attention and we pondered over it, wondering of it was some kind of Elm.  But the seeds weren’t right. Could it have been a Witch Hazel?  We need to remember to check it on one of our winter visits.

After lunch we went to the bird art exhibition. There are about 50 paintings and drawings by Jim Moir, the TV comedian who performs as Vic Reeves. They were excellent, and all for sale. Most were ticketed at £3,300 (some more than that!) and about half were sold.

Public transport details: Train from Central at 10.00 (towards Ellesmere Port), arriving Port Sunlight at 10.17.  Returned from Port Sunlight station at 2.09, arriving Liverpool Central at 2.35.
Next week we are going to Calderstones Park, meeting at Elliot Street at 10.00.

We haven’t been to Eastham Village since late September 2013. It’s a pretty little village just off the busy New Chester Road, and another bit of old England that time seems to have left behind. There are old cottages dated 1699, a local library in an old telephone box and one bus a day in each direction.

We were there to see the church and in particular its Ancient Yew Tree. Britain is particularly rich in ancient yews, with far more than in any other European country. (The Ancient Yew Group has identified 978 ancient or veteran yews more than 500 years old in England and 407 in Wales. France has 77 while Germany and have Spain just four each.) The information board by the tree says ‘When in 1152, the Abbot and Monks of St Werburgh received the Manor of Eastham at the hand of Earl Randall of Chester, the villagers of Eastham entreated the new owners “to have a care of ye olde yew”. In 1898, members of the Royal Archaeological Society, when visiting the village, expressed the opinion that the yew may have been planted originally against the east end of the timber framed wattle and daub chapel which was in being before the Norman Conquest. They said that the tree’s exact age was not known but was possibly 1,500 years’.” More recently, in 1988,  an expert group suggested it was 1600 years old, making it a seedling before the Romans left Britain.

Elsewhere in the village we heard loud calling from above and spotted a pair of Jackdaws on an old chimney stack, peering into the left-hand chimney. We think there was a nest in there, the chicks were calling for food and the adults were hoping they would emerge.

We walked northwards around Ferry Road towards Eastham Ferry and the woods. There was a House Sparrow colony in a thick garden hedge, a Swift overhead, and in Torr Park we saw some butterflies – Speckled Woods and a Large White.

We lingered by the Eastham Ferry Pier overlooking the River Mersey. There was an Oystercatcher on the rocky beach and Cormorants on the oil tanker stanchions by Eastham Lock. We were also looking for Purple Hairstreak butterflies in the oak scrub that falls away from the road edge. We spotted some here in late June 2018, but today we were a couple of weeks too early. They will all still be pupae. Then we walked back through the woods.

Blackbirds and Robins were singing and a family of Wrens crossed the path, about five of them. A pair of Jays were foraging on an old dead tree trunk, perhaps looking for grubs. The path was scattered with early tree seeds and fruits, including these wild cherries.

Public transport details: Bus number 1 from Sir Thomas Street at 10.10, arriving 10.52 at New Chester Road / opp Bridle Road. Returned from New Chester Road / Allport Road on the number 1 bus at 2.15, arriving city centre at 2.50.
No walk next week. On 22nd June we plan to go to Port Sunlight, meeting at Central Station at 10 am.

Churchtown north of Southport is a pretty little village with white-walled houses and some thatched cottages. It is almost as far north as we can go within the Merseytravel area and is a long bus ride from Liverpool.

We were lured there by reports of an Otter. On 9th May this year a Southport website called “On the Spot News” said “An otter that has set up home in Botanic Gardens has become the subject of a much heated debate in recent days. Park rangers at the Churchtown park say they have warned people not to try and catch the otter, which is a protected species. It comes after people on local social media pages debated if the offer needed to be caught after claims it was attacking other wildlife in the park’s watercourse. Despite this being a natural predator, some people have suggested the otter needs to be caught and removed from the park to protect the existing wildlife. However following a number of complaints and concerns made to park ranger, a warning to leave the otter alone has now had to be issued.”
That warning was made by Sefton Council on social media on the same day. “People spending time in Botanic Gardens, Southport, may have heard or even spotted for themselves, there’s a new visitor to the park! An Otter has been spending time at the wonderful park lately. We are so lucky to have this rare, fascinating, and protected animal visiting us, and we want to assure people that the Otter does NOT need any help, and absolutely does NOT need to be caught”

Although we didn’t expect to see the Otter itself (they are active at dawn and dusk, and definitely not when the park is full of visitors) we walked as far north-west as we could, following the little stream, and hoping to see spraint (droppings left as territory markers) or even paw prints in the muddy edges. There WAS one muddy bit, where there might have been a print, but even if it was, it is probably more likely to have been made by a dog.

In a secluded area around a pool in the middle of the park, a path was closed, with a sign that breeding Swans were not to be disturbed. We saw the adult pair later, snoozing at the south end, but there were no cygnets with them. Had their little ones been predated by the Otter? Is that why the local people were so upset? People are often quite protective of “their” cygnets.

We also spotted a Heron near that same quiet pool, and it was perched up a tree, not on the pond banks. Was it wary of attack?

Elsewhere in the park we noted the usual suburban birds. A ragged looking Robin with a beak full of grubs and caterpillars perched briefly on the fence near the entrance then flew off across the road towards Meols Hall. A Pied Wagtail was hunting on the lawns next to the bare beds awaiting  summer planting.

There is a rare tree in the Fernery – a tall Wollemi Pine in a big pot.

I also noticed that the Horse Chestnuts seemed to have more conkers forming than usual. Most years only two or three form from each flower spike, but this year I am seeing clusters of 10 or 12. A good year, perhaps brought on by the warm spring.

On the lake we noted Mallards, Black-headed Gulls, Coots and Moorhens and a few Tufted Ducks. Several Mallard mothers had broods of half-grown chicks. We counted five in one cluster and three in another, so the Otter hadn’t taken all of them.

The moulting Mallards on the bank were very tame and came in very close, within an inch or two of our boots, looking for crumbs. It’s good to see them so trusting of people. They aren’t subject to sticks, stones and attempts to grab them, as some city centre park Mallards seem to be.

One Black-headed Gull had a blue ring on its leg, 241L. I reported it and the result that came back said it had been ringed as adult in Botanic Gardens in December 2023. Subsequently seen at Botanic in October and December 2024, at Marshside in May 2025 and is now back at Botanic Gardens. This one seems not to be an adventurer!

Public transport details: Bus 47 from Queen Square at 10.15, arriving Preston New Road / Marshside Road at 11.42. Returned on bus 49 from Botanic Road / Botanic Gardens at 2.36, arriving Southport Lord Street at 2.45, just in time to catch the 2.51 train back to Liverpool.
Next week we plan to go to Eastham, meeting Sir Thomas Street at 10 am.

After our long dry sunny spell, it was a weekend of high winds and showers. It was very blowy at West Kirby. As we walked down Dee Lane towards the beach the onshore wind sometimes stopped us in our tracks, and there was gritty sand in it, too. There were white caps on the sea out towards Hilbre, and some sailboarders and kite surfers were battling the stiff breeze.

It was high tide, and there were no birds inshore or on the water, just a few gulls hanging off the wind. We headed up Victoria Drive towards Ashton Park and the Wirral Way, seeking calmer conditions. There was nothing exciting on Ashton Park lake, just Mallards, Canada Geese, Coots, Herring Gulls and Feral Pigeons.

So we turned southwards on the calm and sheltered Wirral Way, a stretch we rarely visit. Some birds were singing – Blackbird, Robin, Wren, Chaffinch, but most were deep in the tall hedges, keeping a low profile. The main interest was the wildflowers along the way. Bramble, White Campion, Elderflower, Honeysuckle, Dog Rose and Valerian.

There was a big bundle of developing Ash seeds, called “keys”, overhanging the path. Ash keys are said to be particularly abundant this year.

We stopped for lunch at little park called Cubbon’s Green, where there are views out to the estuary and across the Dee to Wales on the opposite bank. The land was donated to Wirral Council in 1964 by two sisters called Cubbon, on condition it was never built on and kept open. It’s a good spot for viewing waders and raptors in autumn and winter and is said to be a haven for butterflies, but there were none in today’s windy conditions. It is now part of the King Charles III England Coastal Path, which will eventually be a 2,700 mile national trail. When completed it will be the longest managed coastal footpath in the world.

We dropped in to Sandlea Park and Gardens on our way back to the station. The little Almond tree there is doing well, with more than 50 young fruits developing, each about an inch (2.5 cm) long.

There was an extraordinary plant in the south-west corner, against the Dee Lane wall, opposite Morrison’s supermarket.  It was one single stem, 10 or 12 feet tall, and bore copious blue and pink flowers covering the stalk.  It reminded me of Viper’s Bugloss, so is it some giant relative?

Public transport details: Train from Central at 10.05, arriving West Kirby 10.35. Returned from West Kirby station at 2.01, arriving Central 2.35.
Next week we plan to go to Southport Botanic Gardens, meeting at Queen Square at 10 am.

Strawberry Fields is the site of an old Salvation Army orphanage, near the childhood home of John Lennon and remembered in the famous song. He used to climb over the walls and play with the other kids. For many years the old building was a gothic ruin, and Beatles tourists came to stare and write on the ornate gates, which was as near as they could reach. Then the Salvation Army demolished the old orphanage, built a new exhibition space, café and gift shop, landscaped the grounds and opened up to tourists in September 2019. The revenue they generate supports a program to help young people with leaning difficulties get into work.

Their woodland garden and lawns had the usual Wood pigeons, Magpies and Crows, while we spotted Blue Tits and Great Tits in the trees and John had a brief glimpse of a Treecreeper. Despite the small parties of tourists, the garden had an air of serenity and mindfulness. Bits of the old masonry have been saved and used like seats along the path edges and most bear fragments of either Beatles lyrics or Bible verses.

After lunch we crossed Menlove Avenue to Calderstones Park. Although we aren’t good at evergreens we stopped to look at this Scots Pine. These are clearly flowers, but are they male or female? I looked them up at home later. These are all male, found on lower and weaker branches. The female flowers, which become cones, are on higher branches and we didn’t see any of those at all.

On the lake we were charmed by Mallard ducklings, Canada goslings and a young Coot being fed by a parent.

Around the lake we looked at some large clumps of Three-cornered Leek. They are very pretty, but are they spreading? Yes, it forms large mats and is now considered to be invasive in the UK. It is illegal to plant or dispose of it in the wild.

North of the text garden a labelled young tree was a Yellow Buckeye Aesculus flava, native to North America.

On the western edge of the text garden the Handkerchief tree Davidia involucrata was just starting to put out its large white dangling bracts.

It had turned out to be a very hot afternoon, so we made our way out of the park via the very colourful Rhododendron and Azalea walk. The yellow Azalea, Rhododendron luteum, has a very strong sweet scent but is poisonous in all parts, including the nectar and the “mad honey” made from it.

Public transport details: Bus 76 from Queen Square at 10.02, arriving Menlove Avenue / Beaconsfield Road at 10.30. Returned from Mather Avenue / Storrsdale Road at 2.20 on bus 86, arriving Liverpool city centre at 2.50.
No Sunday walk next week. On 25th May we plan to go to West Kirby, meeting at Central Station at 10 am sharp.

We walked from Longmoor Lane, south down Higher Lane, over the railway bridge, past cul-de-sacs of smart new houses and into the Bluebell Woods, tucked away between Aintree University Hospital and Altcourse Prison. It is where two little waterways run close together, the Tue Brook and the Fazakerley Brook.

It seems to be far more open than when we were last here. Did it lose trees to storms, or is it just being cleared for new paths and forest schools? There were also fewer Bluebells than we remembered. Most patches near the northern edge seem to be the non-native Spanish Bluebell, or thoroughly hybridised from gardens. They have tall upright stems, flowers growing all around, and the petals are not very curled back.

I only found one patch with what looked like a native English bluebell (although there may be more deeper in the woods). This one had a stem nodding to one side, flowers only on that side, and very curled-back petals.

The woods were very quiet, apart from the penetrating birdsong. We recognised Blackbird, Robin, Greenfinch, Wood Pigeon, Chiffchaff and Crow. I turned on the Merlin birdsong identifying app. Two of the other loud ones were Nuthatch and Wren (the latter is one we hardly ever see) and it also picked up Blackcap from all over the woods. Whenever I use the Merlin app it always seems to find Blackcaps, but we never see one. We did spot a Song Thrush and a Great Tit and also what may have been a Blue Tit using one of these tree holes.

That patch of land is possibly too wet and uneven to build on, which is why it is preserved as a wood, although it doesn’t seem to be an ancient woodland. We kept seeing Victorian ornamental trees and shrubs like Monkey Puzzle, Rhododendron, a Red Horse-Chestnut tree.  Has it ever been a landscaped park?  The flowers seem wild enough – Cow Parsley, Hogweed, Wild Garlic. All white ones except Red Campion.

After lunch we went through the hospital, crossed Lower Lane and went into Fazakerley Hall Recreation Ground, which is just a long path leading through to Bridgehouse Lane, and with a large meadow in the middle. Here there were more white flowers like Dogwood, Rowan and Hawthorn. There were carpets of buttercups in the meadow.

It’s quite a good spot for butterflies, although we only saw Speckled Woods and some Whites. Here’s a Small White, basking.

Some of the white butterflies might have been Orange-Tips, because there are large patches of its food plant, Cuckoo Flower also known as Lady’s Smock.

Public transport details: Bus 21 from Queen Square at 10.05. arriving Longmoor Lane / Seeds Lane at 10.32. We all went home different ways from outside the hospital.
Next week we plan to go to Strawberry Fields and Calderstones Park. Meet Elliot Street 10 am.

It was the only dry and sunny day of the Easter weekend. Flaybrick was once the principal cemetery of the well-to-do merchants of Birkenhead, but it is now closed to new burials and is managed as a historical garden and arboretum. It has several champion trees. At this time of year bluebells are coming out in the dappled light, and we also spotted Primroses and one large patch of Wood Anemones. The Garlic Mustard was also out, my first this year.

A few butterflies were moving in the distance, including a Small White (or was it an Orange Tip?) and our first Holly Blue of the year. We stopped to look at the memorial tree to Stephen Titley, the  first ranger of Flaybrick, who died in 2002. His tree is a Red Oak, now about 20 years old. I think I remember being shown it when if was quite small, and now it’s way over our heads, putting out its catkins and dainty little leaves. Over the summer the leaves will become much, much bigger, ending up as huge oak leaves, half as long again as your hand.

A Jay appeared to be eating the pink blossom of a ‘Kanzan’ cherry, but it flew off before we could see what was going on. Near the Tollemache Road entrance was another Cherry tree, with dainty pale pink, semi-double blossom on long dangling stalks. It must be in the last flowering group, and I think it is the variety ‘Pink Perfection’, a cross between ‘Longipes’ and ‘Kanzan’. A very lovely one.

In the cemetery we saw the usual city birds, Magpies, Wood Pigeons and a Blackbird. Chaffinches were singing and a possible Thrush flew by. We lunched on the picnic tables at Tam O’ Shanter urban farm where we also heard Robins and Great Tits. There were lots of little kids running around, excited by the Easter activities, but we watched a bee-keeper tending the hives on the edge of the Alpaca field. He (or she) was kitted out in the full bee suit with a smoke can.

We had been talking about our earliest walks, led by Bob (“the Birdman”) Hughes and vaguely remembering mysterious Wirral destinations such as Noctorum and the path called “Thermopylae Pass”. Where had he taken us? After lunch Margaret (who had recce’d earlier) led us eastward along Upton Road, into Noctorum Lane, past some cul-de-sacs of lovely-looking modern houses and into a park we had never been to, called Bidston Court Gardens. It is built on a west-facing slope, with terraces stepping down by winding brick paths. It was once the setting for a house called Bidston Court, built in 1891 by a soap manufacturer called Robert William Hudson. Then It was owned by John Laird of the Cammel Laird shipbuilders, and then by Sir Ernest Royden. In the late 1920s Royden had the house dismantled, moved and rebuilt in Royden Park, where it is now known as Hillbark. Only the grounds remain as Bidston Court Gardens.

We made our way down the sloping paths to the lowest level, where an avenue of trees led us to the junction with Windermere Road and a bus stop to take us back to Liverpool.

Later, at home, I realised we had been on the “Thermopylae Pass” footpath for part of our wanderings in Bidston Court Gardens. It starts at the gate we entered by and ends at the avenue we left by, although it appears to pass through the gardens in a straighter (and possibly steeper) line. It’s purpose seems to have been to cut across the great northward loop of Upton Road and it was probably named by one of the classically-educated previous owners of the old house.

Public transport details: Bus 437 from Sir Thomas Street at 10.04, arriving Upton Road / Bidston Road at 10.30.  Returned on the 433 bus from Upton Road / Warren Drive at 1.56, arriving Liverpool 2.25. 
No walk next week. On 4th May we plan to go Fazakerley Bluebell woods. Meet Queen Square 10 am.

We visited this park for the first time last September, on a wet and miserable day, and agreed how much better it would be in spring. We were right, it’s a lovely spot. Flanking the main path are two flat-topped cherry trees in a prominent position. Unfortunately we had missed the best of their flowering and they had almost gone over. The remaining flowers were white, about 4cm (two fingers) wide, semi-double and hanging down on longish stems. Possibly the variety ‘Shirotae’ (Mount Fuji).

We also spotted a newly-planted avenue of cherry trees, all upward-trained, three on each side of a short path. Happily, they all still had their nursery labels. For my future reference they were: 1R ‘Sunset Boulevard’; 2R Prunus schmittii; 3R ‘Tai-haku’ (Great White)
1L ‘Tai-haku’(Great White); 2L ‘Sunset Boulevard’; 3L Prunus schmittii.
The customary town birds were scattered over the lawns: Wood Pigeons, Magpies, Feral Pigeons and Carrion Crows. One Crow had a big chunk of bread in its beak, but when it saw some gulls closing in with an eye to steal it, it flew off to a quiet spot on a nearby roof. A pair of Mallards were perched on an old sandstone wall surveying the passers-by.

There are a couple of small duckponds adjacent to Silverbeech Road, holding a few pairs of Mallards, one Moorhen and also a Rat sneaking around the edge.

Many of the trees were in flower, hence the warnings about tree pollen on the weather reports. There was Norway Maple (both green and red varieties), Oak, Ash, Wych Elm, Laburnum, Hawthorn and various fruit trees.

We ate our sandwiches in their lovely walled garden, watched by an opportunist Blackbird and entertained by singing Robins. Some Long-tailed Tits were flitting about in a large curtain of Ivy. As well as the manicured flower beds they have a small orchard there, planted as a memorial to A. Graham Harrison, former Town Clerk of Wallasey and Chairman of the Wirral group of the Cheshire Wildlife Trust. It contains a variety of fruit trees, plum, apple and others we couldn’t name, well-attended by pollinating insects.

Then it was off to walk around the lake, dodging the fishermen as we went. More birds here,  including the usual Mallards, Coots and a Moorhen, but also a dozen or more Canada Geese and a few Herring Gulls. There were beautiful Willow trees on the island, and an area of water ringed by posts with what look like old Xmas trees in it. One of the fishermen said it was a place for the Coots to nest, and it looked like one may have already started.

Two lads had caught a big fish, a Common Carp, over 5 pounds they said. They let me take a picture just before they released it. The lake is stocked with carp for the entertainment of the local fishers, and the poor fish are intended just for catching and putting back. What a life for them!

While we were on the bus this morning we looked at the small park off Poulton Road, which we passed quite a distance before our main destination, and we wondered if it was a different part of the same Wallasey Central Park. Later, as we were at the south end of the fishing lake, we saw a path leading in that direction, so we investigated. Yes, it does come out by the lower park along Poulton Road.  Some of it is laid out as playing fields behind Park Primary School, but a smaller section has been left as rough grassland with a brambly Hawthorn hedge between it and the allotments. The Hawthorn’s May flowers were budding and just starting to come out.

Sparrows were cheeping in the hedge and some Privet berries were hanging on from last autumn.

We also saw more butterflies than we’ve seen recently – several pairs of Small Whites and many  Speckled Woods. It was the best wildlife area of the whole day.

Public transport details: Bus 433 from Sir Thomas Street at 10.17, arriving Liscard Road opp. Chatsworth Avenue at 10.40.  Returned from Liscard Road opp. Martins Lane on the 433 bus at 2.20, arriving Liverpool city centre at 2.42.
Next week we’ll be going to Flaybrick and Tam O’ Shanter. Meet Sir Thomas Street at 10 am.