Abbey Meadows

Abbey Meadows

Thursday 5 February 2009

Scaup at Angerton lake











Just enough time to squeeze an hours birdwatching in before work yesterday. I went a few miles west to Angerton lake. 90 per cent of the lake was frozen but a small area of unfrozen water in the middle held good numbers of wildfowl. Presumably some of these birds may have been frozen out elsewhere. A quick count of Teal 126, Wigeon 28, Canada goose 73, goldeneye 8, Mute swan 10, Little grebe 10, Mallard 12 and 2 Scaup among 29 Tufted ducks. As I am a field away from the lake the cropped shot of the Tufted duck was the best attempt I had at capturing the Scaup.

I drove back by Scots gap and Rothley crags where there was a few inches of snow lying about but not a BBC reporter in sight! At Longwitton 8 Yellowhammer among the Chaffinch flock and a dozen Red legged Partridge. How times have changed since I first started out in the seventies where Yellowhammer flocks were too large to get an accurate count and Red legged partridges didn't exist!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

You`re not kidding about the Yammers, AM. They`ve declined at an alarming rate, even down here in Yorks.

Northumbrian Birding said...

Lost the first post !!!
looking at my map for Angerton, which I refer to as Hartburn, does the Hartburn not feed this water ?
I always look on here when passing, last year it was good for late Whoopers.
The decline of Yellowhammers seems very rapid indeed , you sometimes take the common for granted.
Brian

abbey meadows said...

Thanks for the comments on Yellowhammers. In recent years I find the more sympathetic reclamation of former coal workings better for flocks of small birds as the traditional farming methods have gone forever. However, as much of the land west of Morpeth is managed for game birds there is plenty of finches around here as a lot of the land is unimproved and less intensively farmed. B The Hart runs to the north of the lake but it is fed by a stream at Hartburn grange from the west and from the baffle on the east side a small stream flows into the Hart. I have always known this lake as Angerton lake.