A beautiful morning to be out with wall to wall sunshine and blue sky at Leeshaw at -2 degrees on a light NW>3 but still treacherous walking on the hard packed ice.
One of those rare mornings where everything just fell into place with the full flock of Greylags on show in the big field before landing on the water, 2 Stonechat showing briefly as well as a Dipper plus a single Teal on the far bank. This plus a good variety of species as well as several gulls back in the area whilst the icing on the cake was near the end of the watch when all the geese suddenly lifted off from the water as if spooked by something but I couldnt see what.
A look at the gulls by the valve tower revealed a brown bird on the distant dam wall which I thought was a 1st year gull but when scoped it turned out to be what had flushed the geese , a Buzzard, the first I,ve ever seen on the dam wall .
Mid afternoon and a check on Mixenden reservoir in worsening conditions with a NW>4 and very heavy blizzarding snow showers which turned to continuous snow.
As I climbed the banking a cracking adult Great Black Backed gull lifted off the water , flew a circuit then off >SW. Around 200 small gulls were on the water as well as 5 Herring and 4 LBBs, one of the adult Herring had a bright white head still in summer plumage with no winter head streaking.
A full walk around the reservoir left me looking like a snowman but I managed to catch up with the single,long staying Goldeneye along with 3 Mallard.
By now the snow was looking serious and the roads covering so time to get out of there if I wanted to make it home. Cars were already stuck up Whitegate but I managed to keep going and get past them, surprising how you always get one that slows down to a near halt half way up a hill stopping the job. It was the same story going up the bonnet from Bradshaw but luckily nothing was coming down so I managed to sail past them on the wrong side of the road otherwise I,d have been stuck half way up.
Despite all that, a brilliant days birding.
With more snow forecast for tomorrow and no sings of a thaw I dont know how long it will be before I can get back to Fly Flatts.
Leeshaw
2 Stonechat
1 Dunnock
1 f Teal
235 Greylag
81 Canada
7 Herring
c 200 Small gull
4 Fieldfare
1 Heron
28 Lapwing
1 f Goosander
1 Buzzard
1 Dipper
+ usual sp
Mixenden
1 GBB gull
4 LBB gull
5 Herring gull
c 200 Small gull
1 Goldeneye
1 Wren
1 Robin
+ usual sp.
BS