The Naturalists' Notebook

It was a day to see Wirral’s Wonderful Waders. There was a high tide due at Hoylake at about 12.40, which brings the wading birds right up to the remaining bit of beach/marsh.

From Manor Road station we walked down Manor Road and Hoyle Road to Meols Parade, near the lifeboat station.  The weather was mild, overcast and breezy. The tide was still a long way out and we could see a distant thin line of Cormorants at the water’s edge. A few Redshank and a couple of dozen Shelduck were pottering about the pools between the clumps of invasive Spartina grass.

Parade Gardens are right next to the seafront, behind a sheltering wall. This tree shows why that wall is there.

There was a Dunnock on the back of a bench and several Pied Wagtails flew out onto the beach. Flowers included Daises in the grass, Shepherd’s Purse on the edge of a pavement and some Daffodils coming out in a sheltered corner. One flowerbed has been earmarked for an RNLI-sponsored wildflower patch, and it has been adorned with a pair of their sea boots.

A little further north, set back from the seafront, is the small Queens Park. There are some nice Himalayan Birches along the path, with their catkins forming.

In one corner is a kid’s Nature Trail and a bug hotel called Critter Castle, built by local schoolchildren. It is surrounded by very good signage about what creatures the castle might attract – stag beetles, woodlice, solitary bees – a naturalist has been at work, clearly.

We lunched in the shelter of Parade Gardens and used the facilities of Popsy’s Café , just over the road in Hoylake Community Centre. We turned our eyes to the beach, and what a spectacle there was! The tide was now in and great masses of birds were standing on every inch of dry land, apparently sorted into species “layers”.

There were Redshank and Dunlin at front, a few hundred Oystercatchers in the middle and several thousand Knot at the back.

Several groups of birdwatchers with telescopes were looking out from the raised area around the lifeboat station. They said there were Grey Plovers and Black-tailed Godwits amongst the Knot, but we didn’t spot any.  But it reminded us of our late friend Chris Butterworth, who did regular bird counts for the Wirral Estuary Bird Survey (WEBS). When asked how anyone could count so many birds accurately he said “You just count the number of legs and divide by two”.

As the tide started going out again the Knot took to the air, flying in shaped flocks – “murmurations” –  and also swooshing low over the water.

Just beyond the water’s edge were several larger birds which we though were the Godwits, but now I see by the curved bills on my picture they must have been Curlews.

We headed back up King’s Gap and glimpsed a marvellous building we’ve never noticed before. An octagonal lighthouse on Valentia Road, completely surrounded by houses. It was rebuilt in 1866 on the footprint of an earlier lighthouse of 1764, one of a pair called the upper and lower lighthouses. The lower one was at the high water mark and is now gone. Their purpose was to aid sailors to line up on a safe anchorage. The Old Upper Lighthouse and its adjoining keepers’ cottages is now a private residence and is Grade II listed.

Hoylake village centre has the most stylish and wittiest street furniture on Merseyside, with a punning reference to “Knot”. As well as two sculptures of the birds of that name, one on the sidewalk and one on the roundabout, they use the motif of ropes and knots on all the benches, bollards and bicycle stands.

Public transport details: West Kirby train from Central at 10.05, arriving Manor Road 10.30. Returned from Hoylake Station at 14.02, arriving Liverpool 14.35.

At this time of year, when we re-start our Sunday walks, there are often uncommon birds on the local coastline. Today was one of those days and we set off on a twitch. There had been reports of an adult male Smew on Crosby Marine Lake, a very striking white-and-black bird, and it had definitely been seen there on Friday and Saturday, but sadly, it was gone today. I think I have only ever seen one in my life.  But we saw some other unusual birds there, which were nearly as good.

The last few days have been very cold and frosty, but it warmed up yesterday and today was mild with occasional showers. However, Storm Isha is brewing up. In Potter’s Barn park we noted a Robin, Blue Tits, a Blackbird and Grey Squirrels. Someone seems to throw down patches of seed for the birds and one had attracted a shy Collared Dove.

At the flooded car park at the south-eastern corner of the Marine Lake was a party of early-rising birdwatchers, having a break near their cars. They had already been in the adjacent Seaforth Nature Reserve and reported no Smew there, and not on the Marine Lake either. Bad news for us. However, we like all birds, and along the path on the southern edge we passed a noisy colony of House Sparrows, hiding in a thorny thicket near the dock mural.

As we got a view of the water we saw our best birds of the day, two or three Goldeneye and a Red-Breasted Merganser. They were diving and feeding, so there must be quite a lot of shellfish for them on the bottom.

A Heron also flew off, and later we saw a Little Egret in the reeds, then in flight over the water.

We climbed the bank to look through the railings into Seaforth NR, but there was nothing to see. There is no way in on that side: the only entrance is through the main dock gates, and they say that in the interests of security visitors must be members of the Lancashire Wildlife Trust AND apply for an annual permit, which incurs a hefty fee.

But there were Crows and Magpies on the bank, and Oystercatchers and Wood Pigeons on the grass.

We headed into Marine Gardens for lunch. The wind was getting alarmingly gusty, but we found a sheltered spot in the rockery, and listened to the wind roaring through the branches of the old clump of Crack Willow.

This shrub with the red berries gave us pause. I’m sure we have looked at it before, and it looks like some kind of Euonymus. I looked it up at home, and it is Evergreen Spindle Euonymus japonicus. Most gardening websites advise against planting it, as it never flowers or fruits when clipped, they say, but they grudgingly admit it does well in coastal sites.

I could walk home from there, and looked for things in flower as I went. Marine Gardens had a clump of Greater Periwinkle flowering well. There were Snowdrops and Laurustinus in Victoria Park and the small winter-flowering tree Viburnum x bodnantense in a neighbour’s garden. My garden had quince buds just starting to break, a garden-variety Primrose and one very late and ragged flower of New Zealand Daisy Bush.

Public transport details: Bus 53 from Queen Square at 10.10, arriving Crosby Road South / opposite Marlborough Road at 10.40.  The others returned on the 53 bus from outside Waterloo Station at about 1pm, but I could walk home.

It was a bright and sunny day for our last Sunday walk of the year. From New Brighton Station we walked south to Vale Park, then northwards along the prom, with the wind and sun behind us. The tide was near the top, and a few Oystercatchers were idling on the breakwater.

Some kids were playing on the remains of the Black Pearl, but it hasn’t been rebuilt since the storm washed most of it away a few years ago.

Along the edge if the prom a few tattered weeds were clinging to life. Amazingly, both Sea Mayweed and Ragwort were still in flower. What tough plants they are.  A small flock of Turnstones and Redshank had taken up their usual roost on the pontoons.

But what were the two or three smaller ones with their heads tucked in?  Not Dunlin, because their legs were orangey, not the Dunlin’s black. Not Sanderlings, which are whiter than that. Nothing rarer like Stints had been reported, so I think they were Purple Sandpipers, which are said to hang around with Turnstones.

We went for a cuppa in the Floral Pavilion café, then set off home. No more Sunday walks now until 21st January. Happy Christmas to all, and here are Santa and Thomas the Tank Engine from Grosvenor Park Chester last week.

Public transport details: Train from Central at 10.20, arriving New Brighton station at 10.42. Returned on bus 432 from Morrison’s at 2.35, arriving Liverpool 3.00.

From the station, we walked down City Road, along Russell Street and Dee Lane, and turned into Grosvenor Park by its north-east corner. There had been drizzly rain earlier, but it soon stopped, and it wasn’t cold. However the paths were littered with twigs and small branches following last night’s Storm Elin.  The only birds we saw were Wood Pigeons, Crows, Blue Tits, a Robin, and on the lake some Mallards and Moorhens. But there were occasional signs of the turning year.

The Tulip tree by the Rose Garden was full of its weird cone-like fruit.

Across the lawn is a splendid Cedar of Lebanon. A fallen branch showed off the even-length needles, the pointy cones and the odd remains of a mature cone, looking like a small candle, with just the base and central pillar remaining, all the seed scales having flaked off.

We lunched by the River Dee. One Cormorant flew over the water, but we were soon surrounded by Black-headed Gulls, all on the lookout for scraps.  Many had blue Darvic rings, and we were able to note six of them – 2B82, 261A, 285A, 295H, 296H, 297H,

In the evening I reported them on the website of the Waterbird colour-marking Group which returns all the previous sightings immediately. This group were ringed at Chester between February 2021 and December 2022. All previous sightings had been in Chester, although they were all missing every summer, presumably returning to their breeding grounds. We have in the past found BHGs at Chester which had been reported in Norway or Poland in the summer, but nobody has reported any of these recently-ringed birds anywhere other than Chester.

We went a different way after lunch. Over Queens Park Bridge to the Welsh side. The path there is called Salmon Leap.  It overlooks the weir and what appears to be an old water wheel. Apparently there is a Salmon fish trap in the adjacent little building, which is used and monitored at some times of the year, and the scientists reckon about 4000 Salmon a year go up the Dee, mostly quite small ones.

Just south of the Old Dee Bridge is a little green area called Edgar’s Field Park, named after Edgar the Peaceful, Saxon King of Wessex and All England, 943-975, nephew of Athelstan and older half-brother of Ethelred the Unready. He is said to have had a palace on this site. Long before him, the site was a quarry where the Romans cut the sandstone to build the fortress of Deva. There is a surviving shrine to Minerva, the patron goddess of quarrymen, carved into a rock face. She is standing within a stylised temple and holds a spear in her right hand and possibly a shield in her left. An owl is perched on her left shoulder and an altar is shown to her right.

We returned to the station via Bridge Street, passing the Grade II* listed King’s Head pub. It looks like a portrait of Charles I on the pub sign, a king who famously lost his. The building is prominently dated 1622, but it is said to have been re-built at that date on 13th century foundations.  It claims to be multiply haunted and does a thriving trade in “Haunted Hotel” tours.

Public transport details: Train from Central at 10.15, arriving Chester 10.55. Returned on 2.30 train, arriving Liverpool 3.15.

After a few frosty days and nights, this morning it was just above freezing, with water in the puddles. From Rose Brow we walked through Gateacre Village, listening to the bell of the Unitarian chapel summoning their faithful to Sunday service. Then up Belle Vale Road and left through the Loop Line access gate, for a walk of about 3 miles northwards to Knotty Ash.

The Loop Line was once a railway, the Cheshire Lines’ North Liverpool Extension Line, which was abandoned by British Rail 1964. Plans for a walking and cycling route from Aintree to Halewood were drawn up in 1986 and the final part was opened 2000. It is part of the Trans-Pennine Trail,  (Southport to Hornsea, 212 miles) and National Cycle Network route NCN 62.  It wasn’t cold on the path, but it was damp and still, slightly misty. There were just a few icy patches where it wasn’t sheltered by overhanging trees, and which we negotiated gingerly.

There was very little to catch our eyes. No flowers have survived the cold snap, but the young shoots of Cow Parsley appeared unaffected. The only birds we saw were Robins, Blackbirds, a Mistle Thrush and Crows, and one Jay. The trees lining the path were mostly natives – Beech, Birch, Oak, Ash and Hawthorn, with a large London Plane at one junction. A tree laden with Ash “keys” attracted my attention. Have you ever wondered why some Ash trees seem to have large bunches of seeds and others don’t? I learned this week that they are very variable about their sexes (or is it genders?).  Mitchell’s tree book says “Total sexual confusion: some trees all male, some all female, some male with one or more female branches, and vice versa, some branches male in one year, female the next, some with perfect flowers” (meaning flowers with both male and female parts).  So now you know!

We arrived at Sainsbury’s supermarket a bit later than we usually stop, but there were no seats anywhere along the way. After a quick detour inside for their facilities we found it had started to rain gently, so we sat on a bench by the front entrance, under their canopy, to eat our lunches. Then, being so near a main bus route, we called it a day.

Public transport details: Bus 75 from Elliot Street at 10.04, arriving Rose Brow / Seafarer’s Drive at 10.30. Returned from Knotty Ash by various buses around 2pm.

It was a cold and still day, overcast but dry. Landican is a lovely cemetery, neat and symmetrical, beautifully kept, and all the trees grow perfectly, with plenty of room to show off their characteristic forms.

There were birds about, but not in any abundance. A Buzzard drifted over the trees and a Mistle Thrush on a tall bare tree was silhouetted against the grey sky. Crows and Magpies went about their business, and we spotted a Robin, a Blackbird, a female Pheasant crossing a path, Great Tits in a Golden Yew and a party of about a dozen Goldfinch busy around a Lawson’s Cypress, picking  the seeds from the little cones.

Most of the berries were already gone from the trees. The only ones left were in places that are hard for birds to get to, like these Rowan berries on very thin branches.

On the far eastern side John spotted a Brown Hare, glimpsed between headstones and heading for the brackeny edge. There are open fields beyond the hedge, reaching towards the Asda supermarket on Woodchurch Road. We should come back here in spring, when the hares are most active and all the cherry and crab apple blossom is out. But even at this time of year the planting around the central chapels is lovely, with even the almost-bare deciduous trees having colour to show.

The planting goes on, and many new saplings still bear their nursery labels. This one with yellow leaves, on a corner near the chapels, was marked as “Ulmus Lobel”. Ulmus is the Elm genus, but I don’t know what Lobel is, so I looked it up. It’s a hybrid cultivar from Holland, with no proper species name, developed to have good resistance to Dutch Elm disease. One parent was Field Elm Ulmus minor while the other was itself a hybrid of Exeter Elm and Himalayan Elm. Grow well, little tree!

After lunch we crossed the road to Arrowe Country Park. There is a lawn with several true cedars on it. One was definitely an Atlas Cedar, with blueish foliage and dimples in the top of its cones, and I’m pretty sure this one is a Cedar of Lebanon, now a rare tree on Merseyside. Right opposite was a lovely spreading tree with yellowing leaves – a Turkey Oak. There was a Jay in it, foraging for acorns.

By keeping an eye on the fallen leaves underfoot, I was alerted to a couple of unusual Oaks. This one is a Pin Oak Quercus palustris, with large deeply-indented and “pointy” leaves. (There is a Turkey Oak leaf included on the photo for scale).

And I think this one was a Hungarian Oak Quercus frainetto, also with large deeply-indented leaves, but a far more rounded outline. Sadly, neither tree had any acorns below it, or even any empty acorn cups.

By the side of a wooded path was a long curved row of big grey-and-white fungi, looking like a segment of a huge fairy ring. They had white gills in funnel shape, and after looking it up later, I think it might possibly be Clouded Agaric Clitocybe nebularis.

On the way out to the bus, a man coming in the other direction said we had just missed a Fox.

Public transport details: Bus 472 from Sir Thomas Street at 10.12, arriving Arrowe Park Road / Landican Cemetery at 10.45. Returned on 472 from Woodchurch Road / Church Lane at 2.16, arriving Liverpool 2.40

Our goal today was to look for several unusual birds, occasional winter visitors to the local coastline, which had been reported on various birder’s websites. It was a miserable day for it, with drizzly rain nearly all day, but at least it wasn’t cold. The tide was well out, with a few people on the wet sands out towards Hilbre Island, but they were on their way back, as high tide was due at 14.48.  We ticked our first target bird almost right away, a juvenile Great Northern Diver on the Marine Lake.

It wasn’t at all bothered by the wind surfers, but just came up, looked around for a second or two, then dived again. It’s a blink-and-you-missed-it sort of bird when feeding. It has been here for about three weeks, so it is getting plenty to eat – some sort of shellfish on the bottom, I suppose. It is the same species as the bird known in North America as the Common Loon.
The same birder’s website had reported a Common Scoter on the same lake on Saturday, but it was gone today. Pity that, as I have never seen one.  The only other birds about were a Cormorant, the usual gulls, and a Redshank and Turnstone foraging by the edge.

The rain was getting quite persistent so we headed up to Victoria Gardens, where there are little shelters, and sat to wait out the rain and have an early lunch.

The third uncommon bird species we were looking for was a pair of Snow Buntings which had been reported on the rocks by the Dee Lane slipway for a week or two. They occasionally foraged further north along the narrow beach, but had decamped to Little Eye island on Saturday. Had they come back? They weren’t near the slipway, so after lunch we wandered northwards about 500 yards up the beach. No sign of them. There was a Stonechat on the fence at the top of bank and a Little Egret in the saltmarsh, but no Snow Buntings. A dog ran out into the marsh and put up a flock of 20 or so little brown birds. They wheeled around with a raggedy up-and down flight pattern, then settled. We could see where they landed, but they just disappeared into the vegetation. After they came up again they settled on the seaward edge of the marsh, and we could get a look at them at a distance. Hard to make out, but the behaviour and the bouncing flight suggests they were Linnets.

On the way back to the station we cut through Sandlea Park. Their roses are still blooming, some clumps of Feverfew were still in bloom and in the “Incredible Edibles” bed there were a couple of pink strawberry flowers, some sheltered Nasturtiums and a sprig of late raspberries trying to ripen.

Public transport details: Train from Central at 10.05, arriving West Kirby 10.35. Returned on the 2.05 train, arriving Liverpool 2.35.

Sudley House is a Victorian merchant’s house and grounds in south Liverpool, built in 1821 by people with connections to the slave trade, but bought in 1882 by ship-owner George Holt, who was also an art collector. When his surviving unmarried daughter Emma (a pioneer of women’s education) died in 1944 she left the house to Liverpool on condition that the grounds were to be used as a public park, and her father’s art collection was not dispersed.

It was a showery day, more wet than dry, but we were able to look at some of the old trees in the gardens. The two huge old beeches have been lost to storms, but the imposing Tulip tree remains, with just one branch missing.

There are good younger trees, too. Near the Tulip tree is a baby Monkey Puzzle, and opposite the front of the house is a Sweet Gum, Liquidambar styraciflua, known for its spectacular autumn colour.

My nearly 50-year-old Mitchell’s Field Guide (of 1976) says the spiky fruits of Sweet Gum are “Not often seen”, but we are finding them more and more often nowadays, probably as a result of climate change.

A heavy rain shower drove us indoors. George’s Holt’s pictures are now the only surviving, intact collection of artworks once owned by a merchant family. He had a couple of Turners and works by Gainsborough, Reynolds, Romney, Millais and more. Behind a curtain is this lovely “Angel playing a Flageolet” by Edward Burne-Jones, which you probably know well from Christmas cards.

We lunched in shelter on the south-facing covered terrace. In front of it are some small plants I know as Cordyline Palms, but they aren’t palms, they are member of the Asparagus family and more properly known as the New Zealand Cabbage Tree Cordyline australis. They are endemic to New Zealand, and the first specimens known to Europe were collected by Sir Joseph Banks and Dr Daniel Solander, naturalists on the ship Endeavour, during Cook’s first voyage to the Pacific in 1769.

I am used to seeing plumes of mystery flowers high up overhead, but these plants were low enough to see they had ripened to white berries, each with two seeds.

After lunch the rain cleared a bit and we ventured along the southern edge, passing a solitary Larch tree. They don’t do well this far south, and there aren’t many of them, but this one looked better than most.

A volley of squawks alerted us to about five Ring-necked Parakeets which were coming to a bird feeder in the hedge. After they flew off we spotted a Nuthatch, and some Blue Tits and House Sparrows, coming to feed after the green thugs had gone.

Public transport details: Bus 82 from Elliot Street at 9.55, arriving 10.15 at Aigburth Road / Chequers Gardens. Returned on 61 bus at Mossley Hill Road / Elmswood Road, changing to an 86A at Mather Avenue / Rose Lane and arriving city centre 2.15.