Goosander, Mallard, Gadwall #117 - 119

Cold, but dry and no wind, so off we went to do some birdwatching. I've been missing it these past few days. 
We decided on Pennington Flash as we've not been for a while. It was very quiet people-wise, but there were lots of birds around, making it a very enjoyable couple of hours. 
The car park area was full of mallards, Canada Geese, Swans and black headed geese being fed huge chunks of bread by the locals. This meant that the mere was left with the more interesting birds like a male goosander, some tufted ducks, great crested grebes and the odd larger gull. It was nice to see the Goosander as we've not seen once since January.
The Teal hide was the most productive in terms of variety today. After my poor shots of the distant goosander, I was happy to see 2 more males and 5 females, along with a Gadwall. And to make today's blip a triple of unblipped birds this year, there is also some mallards in there too, along with some Teal and a Shoveller. Not bad for one photograph. 
Bunting Hide was awash with little birds - blue, great, coal and long tailed tits, chaffinches, moorhen, reed bunting, bullfinches, LOADS of robins, mostly fighting with each other and a single song thrush. 
We missed out on the water rail that has been seen regularly recently, but did see a tiny little goldcrest that a managed to get a record shot of. One day I will take a good one of a goldcrest :) 
Tomorrow we are going to head onto the Wirral and see what's about at Hoylake/West Kirby and then maybe drop in at Parkgate to look for owls. Hopefully there will be a little more light than today. 

Thanks for all the lovely comments about my meringue cake yesterday. It was delicious, but maybe just a bit too much after an epic Christmas dinner!