The Cherry trees are starting to come out everywhere, and we saw both white and pink early blossom trees from the bus. Despite the low cloud and occasional showers, Stanley Park’s “Field of Hope” (a mass planting of Daffodils in aid of the Marie Curie cancer charity) brightened the day.
Our first call was to look at the pair of Great Crested Grebes, which John had seen doing their famous mating dance a couple of weeks ago. The same pair were still hanging around at the same distant south-western spot, and they were doing their “alternately head-shaking” routine, but it didn’t progress to full-on dancing.
There were no exciting birds on the northern edge of the lake. Mallards, Coots and Moorhens; Canada Geese honking and behaving aggressively, and just one Little Grebe being chased by a Coot. Another Coot was sitting on a nest adorned with fresh Daffodils. Had it collected them itself (unlikely) or had someone thrown some flowers into the water and the Coot followed its nature and added these odd “sticks” to its nest?
There were, of course, very many Pigeons, Crows, Wood Pigeons and Magpies, but also a Robin and a brief glimpse of a Treecreeper. All the early shrubs were coming out: Forsythia, Darwin’s Barberry, Mahonia and a shrub with yellow “bobble” flowers that one of us guessed might be Jew’s Mallow but it appears to have been the Japanese Marigold Bush, Kerria japonica. Willow trees of both sexes were in flower, the males with “Pussy Willow” catkins and the females with spikier flowers.
On the Priory Road side was a single wonderful white Cherry tree.
Different varieties of Cherry bloom at different times, and Mitchell’s tree book lists five sequential groups. The first are the Cherry Plums, which were out two or three weeks ago. I think we are now in the second time zone called “Early” and if so this magnificent tree must be the Yoshino Cherry Prunus X yedoensis which bears white flowers before the leaves.
I am hoping to learn more Cherry varieties this year, and especially hoping to find and identify a Great White Cherry ‘Tai-haku’, which is said to flower in the next time group “Early-Mid”. It has huge white flowers, 6-8 cm, almost twice the size of the ones on this tree, which are 3.5-4 cm.
We came around to the Great Crested Grebes again, and one was apparently checking out a Coot nest, with the Coot still on it. I thought it was going to be seen off aggressively, but the Coot just gave it a hard stare.
We had seen Great Crested Grebes in other spots on our circuit of the lake and thought it was the same pair moving about, but we eventually concluded that there must be TWO pairs in Stanley Park at the moment, which is hopeful. One came quite near the bridge and I got a good shot of it.
And I leave you with a back view of a pair of Mallards. They are such common birds, it’s easy to forget how beautiful they are. And we don’t often get a good look at the complex feather patterns on their rear ends.
Public transport details: Bus 19 from Queen Square at 10.15, arriving Walton Lane / Bullens Road at 10.35 (outside Everton’s Goodison Park football stadium). Returned on the 19 bus from Walton Lane opp Newby Street at 2.00, arriving Liverpool at 2.15.
Next week we plan to walk some of the Wirral Way from Hooton to Hadlow Road and back. Meet at Central Station at 10am.