Coot at Lapwing Lake

On Wednesday I showed you Lapwing Lake at Moore Nature Reserve. Here is what I found swimming across the lake.

The Coot (Fulica atra) is a common bird in British waters. It is all black with a distinctive white beak which distinguishes it from its smaller cousin, the moorhen, which has a red beak. Coots feed on aquatic plants, like duckweed and grasses, and animals such as snails and larvae brought up from the bottom of the pond or river.

A contribution to
Weekend Reflections;
Saturday Critters;
Camera Critters.

Lapwing Lake

One of the lakes at Moore Nature Reserve which comprises almost 200 acres of woodland, meadows, lakes and ponds. It has been managed as a nature reserve since 1991, after being used as farmland and for sand quarrying. It is managed by wardens employed by FCC Environment, operators of the nearby Arpley Landfill site. Arpley Landfill began operating in 1988 and covers more than 500 acres. The landfill is being restored to a mix of woodland and grassland and, together with Moore Nature Reserve, should eventually provide an important public amenity and area of rich biodiversity on the edge of what is a busy, and growing urban area.

More information about the nature reserve can be found on its website.

All of my photographs taken that day can be found at Geo-trips plotted on a map and available as a slideshow.

A contribution to
Our World Tuesday;
NF Trees and Bushes;
ABC Wednesday;
Wednesday Waters.

Bench and gorse tree at Moore Nature Reserve

Last week my friend Gordon White took me on a visit to Moore Nature Reserve near Warrington. It comprises almost 200 acres of woodland, meadows, lakes and ponds and is home to many diverse species of plants, animals, birds and other wildlife. Here am I sitting on a bench underneath a gorse tree.

Here is my own photo of the same bench and tree a few moments after Gordon had walked on by.

More information about Moore Nature Reserve can be found on its website.

A contribution to Our World Tuesday and NF Trees and Bushes.

Shadows on Bridge #2

Bridge #2 on the Peak Forest Canal carries the B6139 Ashton Street over the canal near Shepley Industrial Estate.

We passed under it last Friday when we celebrated our son's 34th birthday and escaped the aftermath of the election by taking a trip on Community Spirit, a narrowboat operated by the East Manchester Community Boat Project.

On this section of the journey the sun shone and cast shadows of the trees on the bridge.

A contribution to Shadow Shot Sunday.

ABC Wednesday: C is for Cheetham's Cattle

These two photo's were taken in 2000 at the Gee Cross Fete. Cheetham and sons farm on Werneth Low and used to deliver milk all around the Hyde area. These belong to the Longdendale Herd of Pedigree Red Poll cattle.

I thought that Mr Cheetham had retired from farming a few years ago, but have since learnt that although they no longer have a milk round they are still busy producing.

For more C posts visit ABC Wednesday.

More animals on Camera Critters.

Trans Pennine Trail: Green Pastures to East Didsbury

This is part of the Trans Pennine Trail leading out of Green Pastures, Heaton Mersey towards a tunnel under Parrs Wood Lane. The route is along a former railway line running from New Mills through Heaton Mersey and Chorlton-cum-Hardy to Manchester.

This is looking back under the tunnel. It looks better in monochrome.

  © Copyright Chris Wimbush and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.

Chris Wimbush's photograph taken in January 2011 shows where the footpath used to continue along the line of the dismantled railway towards the bridge carrying Kingsway. The route has been diverted as the East Didsbury tram station at the end of the South Manchester Line is being built on the site.

Here is how it looks now with construction work ongoing. The station is due to open in Summer 2013 and according to the trammstop plan the line of the trail will be re-instated.

Plans were originally drawn up for a Metrolink tramway via East Didsbury to Stockport but the extended route was withdrawn in 2004 due to lack of funding. If they are ever revived then the path under the tunnel is unlikely to look anything like it does now.

A contribution to Sunday Bridges at San Francisco Bay Daily Photo.

Shadows across Wellington Bridge.

This is Wood Street, Stockport, Cheshire.

The bridge carries Wellington Road South which is the main A6 road from Carlisle and Manchester through Stockport to Buxton and London.

Beyond the bridge is Mersey Square, Chestergate and Stockport's town centre.

Below trees on the left is the bus station.

Yesterday's bright sun cast tree shadows both across the road and the bridge.

A contribution to Shadow Shot Sunday

Sunday Bridges at San Francisco Bay Daily Photo

and Scenic Sunday.

Shadows and Reflections at Millgate Bridge

The River Goyt at Stockport passes over a weir before going under Millgate Bridge. It then flows under the Asda superstore. I took this last Sunday from the side of a car park.

More reflections in the river and my own shadow looking across the river can be seen on my photoblog sithenah.



This is the view looking upstream.

Today's post is a contribution to:
Weekend Reflections and
Shadow Shot Sunday as well as
Sunday Bridges on San Francisco Bay Daily Photo.

ABC Wednesday:B is for Brewer's Dray

A Brewer's Dray is a waggon used by breweries to transport barrels of beer to their pubs. At one time they were drawn by horses but later motorised drays came to be used.


This one belongs to Stockport brewers, Frederic Robinson Ltd., and these photographs were taken in 2010 when Stockport was celebrating the 750th anniversary of its market.


The two and a half ton, 27 horse power vehicle was manufactured by Thorneycroft and first registered in Somerset in 1927. It had an average speed of 20-25 mph and fuel consumption was 6 mpg.


Robinson's acquired the vehicle in 1980 from the Irwell Street Metal Co.Ltd. of Ramsbottom and had it restored by Ollerton Engineering Services of Salmesbury Bottoms and painted in the livery carried by similar waggons owned by Robinson's at the beginning of the 20th century.


Back in the 1950s the vehicle was still down in Somerset. It belonged then to Mr A E Chedzoy from Martock, whose business was that of mobile ironmonger-cum-oil-merchant. The photograph above is used here courtesy of David Gibbs. Read about its earlier life in his article Mr Chedzoy's Oil Boy first published in A Miscellany of Merriott Memories (1989) and now available on the Merriot Local History Group website.

For more "B" posts visit ABC Wednesday

Shadow Shot Sunday: Bridge over the River Goyt

I was taking some photographs yesterday afternoon of the Carrington Road bridge over the River Goyt at Stockport. My vantage point was a footbridge that runs almost parellel to the road bridge.

It wasn't until later that I realised how the low afternoon sun had cast a shadow of the footbridge and myself onto the parapet of the road bridge.

In case you are wondering, that's my shopping trolley by my side.

Posted as a contribution to Shadow Shot Sunday and also Sunday Bridges.

Vote for Best of Hyde 2011

The time has come to vote for the best of Hyde DP 2011.

View the twelve contenders at Best of Hyde 2011 and vote for your favourite three photographs.

Voting closes 12 noon GMT, Friday 30th December 2011.

ABC Wednesday: Z is forplatform Zero at Stockport Station

The Easternmost platform at Stockport is number Zero.

It was added in 2003 but not used until 2008.

Only three other stations in the UK have a platform zero, Edinburgh Haymarket, London King's Cross and Cardiff Central.

For more Z posts visit ABC Wednesday.

ABC Wednesday: W is for Waste Recycling Centre

This is part of the new Household Waste Recycling Centre at Bredbury Parkway as viewed from the footpath alongside.


Here is the main entrance to the site.


This is how the site looked when I was walking down the footpath in April 2009.

For more W posts visit ABC Wednesday.

ABC Wednesday: S is for Stop & Rest in Stalybridge

Stop and Rest is the name of a public house in Stalybridge.

I don't drink so cannot tell you what it is like inside. A lot of pubs in Stalybridge have changed their names in recent years and quite a few (as elsewhere) have closed down. There are plenty left though including both the one with the shortest name and the one the longest name. I have photographed the former but not the latter. That'll have to wait for another day.

For more S posts visit ABC Wednesday.

ABC Wednesday: R is forRealm of Telescopes

This haiga featuring my father at Jodrell Bank in 1971 is my contribution to Realm of Telescopes, an international cosmopoetic essay about telescopes centered around the SARM pilgrimage to GranTeCan.

Mike Simmons, founder/president of Astronomers Without Borders and chair of Global Astronomy Month writes

The great observatories of the world have always been places of pilgrimage for scientists and enthusiasts. They are the temples of wisdom of the modern age, where knowledge is captured in nothing less than the light of the Universe. Those who visit them are always humbled, sometimes by the technology and sheer mass of the huge instruments, other times by being in the presence of the seekers of the truths that the Universe hides. Sometimes those seekers are the "ghosts" of our history - long-gone predecessors who spent their lives building that knowledge a few photons at a time.

This is one of six webpages that have been compiled by the Romanian Society for Meteors and Astronomy and coordinated by Andrei Dorian Gheorghe and Valentin Grigor.

• EXPEDITION TO EL GRAN TELESCOPIO CANARIAS is based on a SARM and Astro Travels expedition in October 2010, and was open to ulterior submissions from those who visited or dream to visit the biggest optical telescope in the world and the largest international concentration of telescopes in the northern hemisphere, placed in the Canary island of La Palma.


• TELESCOPES IN TIME AND SPACE is an astropoem by Andrei Dorian Gheorghe in which he visits 21 telescopes.


• THE COSMIC BEAUTY OF LA PALMA contains a wealth of photographs of their expedition to the island.


• THE REALM OF TELESCOPES is a collection of personal contributions that adds to our collective knowledge and perception of great observatories.


• HAPPY OBSERVATIONAL NIGHTS IN LA PALMA provides us with just what the title says it does.


• POST-SCRIPTUM celebrates Global Astronomy Month, April 2011.

BBC News: Jodrell Bank observatory has been responsible for some hugely important astronomical discoveries since it was established after the Second World War, but there have been doubts over its future in recent years due to constant funding worries. Now it has been selected as the headquarters for a £1.3bn project to build the world's biggest radio telescope. The new headquarters at Jodrell Bank will open in January 2012, superseding the existing project office at the University of Manchester.

For more R posts visit ABC Wednesday.

ABC WednesdayG is for Gatley Green

Gatley Green is a conservation area in Gatley Village, Cheshire.

These photographs were taken last July.


For more G posts visit ABC Wednesday.

Shadow Shot Sunday:Stockport Bear Pit

A cold Monday morning in Stockport. A strong sun casts low shadows. In the background is Mersey Square, the front end of the Merseyway Shopping Centre built over the culverted infant River Mersey. In the foreground are the icy steps leading into the bear pit which overlooks the emergence of the Mersey. Bear baiting was abolished in the 1830s but prior to that bears were kept in large caves cut into the sandstone at the foot of High Bank Side.

For a more extensive and coloured view of this scene see Geograph.

For more shadow shots visit Hey Harriet.

ABC Wednesday R is for Reddish South Station

Originally Reddish South station consisted of two island platforms with four tracks. One of these track beds has been sold off, while another has been filled in. The second island is now inaccessible as there are no longer steps down to it. According to the 2007/8 National rail figures, Reddish South had only 47 entries and exits in a 12 month period, making it the UK's least used railway station.


Reddish South together with Denton railway station on the Stockport to Stalybridge line are famous for having one train a week (the "Denton flyer") in one direction only. This means they are technically still open.

Most maps of the Greater Manchester Rail Network do not include Reddish South and Denton.


The "Denton flyer" is what is known as a "Parliamentary ghost", a train that operates a Parliamentary service - that is to say a token service to a given station, thus maintaining a legal fiction that either the station in question is in fact open, whereas in reality the train operating company in question has almost completely abandoned the station. These services run at all only because rail transport is heavily regulated in the United Kingdom and it is therefore considerably cheaper for a train operating company to run a parliamentary service than it is to go through the full legal process of applying for a station or line to be permanently closed.


Network Rail, in their Route Utilisation Strategy (RUS) for the North West, were proposing closure of Reddish South and Denton stations and withdrawal of the remaining passenger service. The line itself would remain open for freight and diverted passenger workings. However, a new open-access operator called Grand Union had proposed using the line for services between London and Bradford via the West Coast Main Line, using Guide Bridge station as a stop. This proposal has since been dropped.

Friends of Reddish South Station have been running a campaign to bring more passenger trains onto this line since 2008. The object of the campaign is to secure a frequent service running between Stockport and Manchester Victoria.

For more R posts visit ABC Wednesday.

Shadow Shot Sunday/Sunday Bridge: Tatton Arms Footbridge

Yesterday I showed you Tatton Arms Bridge together with its reflection in the river Mersey at Northenden.

It is from this bridge I took the photograph looking downstream past the Heron sculpture and towards the Northenden Bridges which I featured last week.

The footbridge leads to a section of the Trans Pennine Trail which I followed from here down to the motorway bridge.


Here is looking back towards the Tatton Arms from which the bridge gets its name. It was a grand Edwardian public house but alas closed down in 2007 and has an uncertain future.

More about the area can be found on the website of the Northenden Water Park Friends.

See more Shadow Shot Sunday posts at Hey Harriet.

See more Sunday Bridges at San Francisco Bay Daily Photo.

Weekend Reflections: Tatton Arms Bridge

As promised last week when I posted photographs of Northenden Bridges, here now is the Tatton Arms footbridge from which I took this photograph looking over the weir on the River Mersey.

Tomorrow I'll show you a closer view of the footbridge.

For more weekend reflections visit Newtown Area Photo.