Birding around Hartlepool

A few hours birding in the Hartlepool area. with Chris. Our first stop was just past RSPB Saltholme where we stopped to look for a ruddy shelduck, but we could not see it. We moved on to the lifeboat station where we walked out a little way so that we could look into the harbour, and we managed to spot a long tailed duck.
Town Moor was our next destination as snow buntings had been seen recently, but we could not see any. Back to our first stop as the shelduck had been seen. Chris pulled into a layby next to another car. The driver was using his car as shelter as he rested his telescope on the car wing mirror. We managed to see the ruddy shelduck among some canada geese.
Cowpen Bewley Country Park was our next stop, where we added several birds to our list, including yellowhammer, blue, great, coal and long tailed tits, chaffinches, robin and tree sparrows.
We then went to Saltholme and went into Phil Stead hide..
Teal were sheltering in the reeds

gadwall were preening

Not many birds to see on the reserve. Chris was talking to a local birder who told him a bout a glaucous gull on the reserve. Chris drove to the main road and found somewhere to pull in.We could see a group of gulls but could not see our target bird. A birder was parked a short distance away so Chris went to talk to him and came back and was able to find the bird.

A trip down North Gare road did not produce any birds to add to our day list. Dormans Pool was our last stop. We saw two males and a female stonechat in the field in front of us.

A very pleasant day out with a day list of 49 birds in what was not very favourable weather conditions.