It had been many weeks since I had visited the Pilling area of Lancs. I made a couple of trips to the area recently to catch up on the birdlife. As expected a number of pink footed geese and whooper swans had arrived from their Icelandic breeding grounds. The Pilling area is a traditional winter haunt for swans and geese and a drive around the lanes will guarantee finding flocks feeding on the fields.
A favourite food is the leftover potatoes. The swans in particular seem to make for the fields with unharvested potatoes close to or just under the soil.In the images below the whoopers can be seen enjoying the leftovers. A number of juvenile swans were with the adults and were learning the best areas for food.
The geese mostly seem to enjoy grazing the grass. It was nice to see these visitors from Iceland back in Lancs. Also evident were numbers of curlews, a declining species but still in good numbers here in winter.
Shown below my better efforts with the camera with the swans, geese and curlews. Thanks for looking in and my next posting will be of the red deer rut in Lakeland.
Brian Rafferty
I am based in Preston. Lancashire. This central location enables me to travel easily to a wide variety of habitats in the North of England. I tend these days not to travel very far as I find that there is plenty to see not very far from home. On my own doorstep are a wonderful variety of habitats - natural woodlands, open fells and hill country, unspoilt river valleys and I have easy access to the delights of the Lake District and Yorkshire Dales National Parks. As you will see from my bird images much time is spent at the wonderful coastal sites forming part of Morecambe Bay and the Ribble Estuary e.g. Marshside and Leighton Moss. In recent years Digital Photography has taken over from Video and as time has moved on I have acquired more and more equipment - as you do!!
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