Gorton Ressers again,14.5.2025.

 Has my mate wasn't going too Morrison's today, I went over to the Gorton lower resser again to see what babies there might be and to my amazement there was the resident swans  with seven chicks!.

Their nest must have been well hidden!, because these chicks are quite big.

This short video shows on of the parents treading the water to disturb the sediment on the bottom so the chicks can get to the crustaceans and bugs from out of the mud!.

Back on dry land for the afternoon nap whilst mum and dad do their ablutions.

 The coot family were doing well out in the open with parents feeding the babies with weed from the bottom.

Then it was round to the Great Crested Grebe nest to see how mum was doing on her nest. Nice well hidden spot, unless you have a big zoom camera.

After a long time studying her, has she seemed to be making a lot of movement, I was rewarded with this sight of a chick poking it's head out from between her wings!!.

That's it, if you've never seen a grebe chick before, it looks like a humbug with black and white stripes down it's neck  

 Then there was another one.

Though I stayed quite a while afterwards, only saw another one that actually came out from under her but didn't manage to snap that one!.

Just to show you what the young ones look like, here are a couple of pictures I took a few years ago. the young ones ride on her back until they get to big and heavy and she decides she's had enough!.

Dad doing a good job of feeding the babies, this one had 6 babies, 3 on each side of mum.

Then it was over to Morrison's for lunch, a bit later than usual not that it mattered as I wasn't meeting anyone today.

All the cabinets are being changed at the moment though out the store and I was told there was no fish and no cheese toasties so I went for a sandwich and coffee, and the assistant said "for another 25p you can have the meal deal which means you can have any cake too!" so got the deal!

Was sorry afterwards has my stomach doesn't cope well with eggs! and I finished in the toilet before coming home!, won't be having that again, nice as it was!.

Another good day.

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