Hundred End's hundreds of Whoopers

I enjoyed a couple of hours exploring around Hundred End and Hesketh Out Marsh this afternoon. The sun was shining which made it particularly enjoyable. From the seawall at Hundred End I scanned the NNR and could see huge but distant clouds of waders and wildfowl wheeling around over the pools and saltmarsh, the tide was dropping and I saw the resident Great White Egret grabbing fish stranded in tidal pools. A distant flock of c.600 Pink-feet provided company for a single Barnacle Goose, but the flock was to far away to look through properly. A Kingfisher flew by and briefly perched on the metal barrier of the Hundred End sluice gates; a unexpected splash of colour. Three separate groups of Whooper Swans could be seen from the seawall, the largest of 259 was a couple of fields inland of Hesketh Out Marsh and contained six broods of one, eight of two, four of three and one of four. I didn't go through the other groups in detail; 76 near Shore Road and 15 on the NNR. 62 Tree Sparrows in the hedges inland of HOM was the biggest flock I've seen around there for a long time. I bumped into Colin and Angie Bushell out birding/dog walking and we discussed seeing Hen Harriers; which we pretty much instantly did, a distant ring-tail hunting along the outer seawall, flushing flocks of Teal, Wigeon and Mallard as it did so. Colin and Angie carried on with the dogs and saw a female Goosander on the Scaup pool and I happily headed home for a warming brew and a double helping of football carnage...

Whoopers drifting past at Hundred End

 

Looking towards Hundred End and beyond form Hesketh Out Marsh