The R.S.P.B. North West Marine Conservation Officer, Clare Reed, and her colleagues, will be at Pickerings Pasture Saturday, 20th August 2011, from 11am until 4pm. They will be in RSPB uniforms and will have telescopes, so they should be easy to find. They are visiting the site to show the public some of the wonderful wildlife that occurs on the Mersey Estuary.

The visits will be coinciding with an incoming or ebb tide and so good numbers of wading birds should be seen roosting, either on the sandbanks or flighting to the nearby roosting sites, on Hale Marsh, by the bird hide.

Recent sitings from Pickerings Pasture have included a flock of over a thousand black-tailed godwit, about three hundred lapwing (which will soon be increasing), curlews, oystercatchers, dunlins, redshanks and common sandpipers.  The first golden plovers are also due back soon. There will be large numbers of gulls present and recently two adult yellow-legged gulls were found amongst the more common species. About now the Mediterranean gulls usually arrive back on the estuary.

From the bird hide it may be possible to see the kingfisher, as part of the pool has been flooded by the high tides. It hasn't been seen yet this year but could arrive any time now. The large flocks of Canada geese, having now moulted, are very obvious together with cormorants and grey herons.

Also passing overhead will be swallows, house martins and swifts starting their long migration to Africa. The bushes and trees on the pastures should have migrant warblers, feeding up before departing on their migration. Flocks of goldfinches have also been around recently.

So why not pop down to Pickerings to meet up with the RSPB and spend a pleasant time enjoying the estuary and its wildlife.

A lapwing and a black-tailed godwit

The RSPB speaks out for birds and wildlife, tackling the problems that threaten our environment. Nature is amazing - help us keep it that way. Click here to join today www.rspb.org.uk/join

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 Dunlins on the bank