A Quick Visit to Sandwell Valley

A quick visit to Sandwell Valley on Saturday with my Birders-in-Law. To avoid paying Sandwell Council to park we drove around to the RSPB car park and started from there, I know tight aren't we!

We only had a couple of hours and spent most of that time in the hide, it's nearly always shut when we go so that was a treat! Nice friendly, if a tad noisy, people in there, so a nice time was had, especially with a couple of Snipe showing well up one of the channels;

Not much else of note, a Littrle Egret was flying around the river, but didn't come close, there were the usual Lapwings, Cormorants, Black-headed Gulls and some distant Goosander.

A nice female Tufted Duck came by;

and a Kingfisher put in an appearance over the far side of the lake;

It moved from post to post before coming right past the hide like a little missile.

It was the Autumn all-dayer in the West Midlands, for the non-birders reading this, that is when (twice a year Autumn and Spring) all the nature reserves in the West Midlands have an unofficial competition to count the most species of birds, between dawn and dusk, on their patch. I believe Sandwell Valley ended up on 88, of which we saw a meagre 24!

A Belated Sandwell Valley Report!

A couple of weeks ago we mad a trip to the Valley with our good friends Wendy and Tim. We started of from the Forge Mill car park and did the RSPB 'bit', sadly the hide was shut as there were works going on on the paths, so we detoured down the muddy paths cutting out part of the reserve.

Tufty's were showing well as usual,

 and it was nice to see the Black-headed Gulls back in their Summer plumage,

 a couple of Oystercatchers were sunning themselves,

 and if you look closely there is a single Snipe on the left of this photo, keeping the Lapwing company.

 I was surprised to find two Yellow-legged Gulls, keeping to themselves away from the hoards of Black-headed Gulls.

 Even though Buzzards are now a common sight, I still love taking photos of such a brilliant bird.

Other birds of note at Forge Mill were plenty of Goosander, although none came close enough for a decent photo, likewise a few Pochard were about, and a pair of Shoveler seen from one of the screens. The feeders at the visitor centre provided Bullfinch, Greenfinch, the usual Tits, but unfortunately no sign of Willow Tits this time.

So after a good walk we popped back in the car and went over to Swan Pool for another walk.
At first sight nothing to special, but like Buzzards, Great Crested Grebes are always worth a photo or three!

A pair of Goldeneye were out in the middle of the pool:

always worth seeing. We then saw our first Stonechats of the year,

 The pools through out the Valley held plenty of Tufted Ducks,

 Grey Heron

 and as we wandered back, this Cormorant was seen showing off.

 The finally a Song Thrush popped out by the Car Park.

 A total of 39 species were seen, so not great but not bad either!

First visit to Sandwell Valley this year

Only 6 days in to the year and I'm already four days behind with this post, too busy putting the house back to normal after Christmas and the New Year.

So on Monday we managed to nip out for a couple of hours down to the Valley, we decided to have a walk around Swan Pool and up into Priory Woods for a change instead of Forge Mill and the RSPB Reserve. Quite forgot the Baggies were at home, but thankfully the Birmingham Road was clear as it was only a couple of minutes to kick off as we went by.#

We were rewarded for this change by a pair of Goldeneye on the pool, our first sighting was too far for a photo, so we walked on round to get closer, then I couldn't find them! But birds being birds they had now moved further away. I eventually found the female again so took a distant shot for the record:

However a pair of Little Grebe were a bit more obliging,

Other birds on the pool were, Black-headed Gull, Lesser Black-backed Gull, Tufted Duck, Mute Swan, Canada Geese, Great Crested Grebe, Mallard, Wigeon and of course Coot and Moorhen.

We continued our walk into Priory Woods and around the Ice House and Cascade Pools, (only know these names because I have just looked on Sandwell's website for a map of the area!) We had hoped to see some woodland birds but only saw a few Blackbirds. As usual we found a bench (opposite the Cascade Pool that was mostly frozen) and stopped for our obligatory coffee.

The pool hood a a few Tufted Duck, Coot and Moorhen, but that was all apart from some Crows and a flyover by a Grey Heron, that took up residence quite high in one of the trees opposite.

We continued our walk past the Ice House Pool, where a number of Goosander were about, again a record shot as the light was fading fast,

so as the light was going and the temperature was dropping with the Sun we headed back to the car.

One word of caution if you haven't been to the Valley for a while, Sandwell Council have now implemented charges for parking, it's not expensive, just annoying!

Anyway another 6 species added to the list for the year.

The Last Post (for 2016!)

We have been for a couple of late afternoon walks in the last two days, Clent and Sandwell Valley.

Clent was glorious as the sun was going down,

although the whole experience was somewhat spoiled by the huge numbers of marauding out of control dogs! I have never seen so many people out with dogs and having total disregard for what their mutts are up to! I love dogs but their selfish owners are another matter! It also appears a number of dog owners are illiterate. The National Trust have put up loads of quite obvious signs on paths in certain parts to say dogs should be kept on leads, but obviously there must be a lot of 'special' people who are exempt. Anyway rant over..... birds were very few and far between, too many ...... dogs!

Sandwell Valley though was much better, not too many dogs! Just,
Goosander,

 two pairs of Snipe,

 Shoveler,

 and plenty of Black-headed Gulls,

Great Crested Grebe

along with Pochard, Wigeon, Tufted Duck, and all the other usual suspects.

Happy New Year

Happy New Year from Sandwell Valley

As always on New Years Day we go somewhere local for a couple of hours to get out a bit after the New Years Eve festivities. So our choice this time was to go with Jo & Jimmy to Sandwell Valley on what turned out to be a very dull and ultimately very wet New Years Day afternoon.

As we were quite late getting out we decided to head straight for the hide and a welcome cup of coffee as being New Year we didn't know what time the hide might shut. It was also a chance to try out my new camera, a Nikon D5300. This is a replacement for my D3200 that has given up the ghost (again!!) I decided it wasn't cost effective to get it repaired and I got a great deal on a D5300. Anyway enough of that.

So what was about for our short visit, firstly a large number of Goosander were about, which was very nice:

As you can see also plenty of Black-headed Gulls were about too.
Shovelers are always nice to see and added to the 2016 scoreboard:

as did this obliging Grey Wagtail:

As its a new year and it came close I let this Magpie pose for a photograph!

Although this Oystercatcher was trying to hide from the camera I got it in the end:

Finally from the hide I took this BHG flying past:

At 2:30 the hide closed and we retired to the Visitor Centre to watch the feeders and have another coffee, it was now pouring, so we stayed put until about 4ish watching the finches and tits on the feeders. It was then a trudge back through the rain to the Forge Mill Car Park.

So our starting list for 2016 at the valley was:

Blackbird

Black-headed Gull

Blue Tit

Bullfinch

Carrion Crow

Chaffinch

Coal Tit

Coot

Cormorant

Dunnock

Gadwall

Goldfinch

Goosander

Great Crested Grebe

Great Tit

Greater Canada Goose

Greenfinch

Grey Heron

Grey Wagtail

Lapwing

Lesser Black-backed Gull

Magpie

Mallard

Moorhen

Mute Swan

Oystercatcher

Pied Wagtail

Pochard

Reed Bunting

Shoveler

Sparrowhawk

Starling

Teal

Tufted Duck

Wigeon

Woodpigeon

Sandwell Valley "A Quickie"

Last week we took our partners in crime Jo & Jimmy for a quick whirl around the Valley before going out for a certain persons 70th birthday meal. That person shall remain nameless, Jo!

Anyway we didn't have much time (as usual!!) so we just opted for a quick turn around Forge Mill lake and the RSPB reserve. Firstly I have to say the new visitor centre is making progress and its huge compared to the old one. Looking forward to the opening sometime in the summer I believe.

Anyway the tour provided few photo opportunities, birds to far away or the Sun in the wrong place, I suppose the highlight was the Pintail showing in front of the 'Closed as Usual' hide, no photo worth posting, that falls into the to far away category. So here are a few snaps:
The Wigeon just wouldn't turn to face us!

 Neither would this Gadwall

 This Shoveler was also playing hard to get with the low sun right behoind it

 Bullfinches know how to pose though

 as did this Robin

Apart from these the list was added to by: Goosander, Cormorant, Teal, a very fast fly by by a Kingfisher, Willow Tit, Great Tit, Blue Tit, Canada Geese, Tufted Duck, Mallard, Black Headed Gull, Lesser Black Backed Gull, Pochard, Grey Heron, Lapwing, Dunnock and Corvids. We searched for the Snipe, but on this occasion no luck.

TTFN

Sandwell Valley Again!

Tina was taking her Mom to the Theatre this afternoon, so I went off to Sandwell Valley for a couple of hours, nothing much to add to the last visit apart from a Pintail and a few extra photos.

I did manage to get in the hide though, it was open so at least I could have a sit down in the warm, well not freezing, and have a coffee and a chat with the friendly Volunteers. So here are a few snaps from today, again the light wasn't great and it got murkier as the afternoon went on:
Tufted Duck:

 Grey Squirrel:

 Bullfinch:

 Great Tit:

 Robin:

 Chaffinch:

 Pintail:

 Snipe:

 Gadwall:

 Goosanders:

TTFN!