Birds do not generally waste energy moving around aimlessly, and if flocks are seen moving in a given direction, they are most certainly engaged in a purposeful exercise. This was indeed true of the 1,100 Pink-footed geese moving north-west in 10 skeins over the Croston / Eccleston area at between 12.15 and 12.30 pm on that day. The same movement had been noted over Birkacre at around 12 noon. Contacts in the Sheffield Bird Study Group confirmed a notable passage of what were probably the same birds heading in our direction over the Sheffield area earlier on the same day.

This event was a classic example of post Christmas return migration of Pinkfeet from their winter feeding grounds on the Norfolk sugar beet fields, north west to traditional west coast mosslands, prior to their Spring return to nesting colonies among the Dwarf Willow of the Icelandic and Greenland tundra.

A noticeable change in the pattern of Pinkfeet movement has developed over recent years. Prior to 1990, after dispersal from Iceland in late September / early October, many geese lingered on the west coast (Solway / Morecambe Bay / Ribble) before moving south east to Norfolk and the Yorkshire Wolds, with a return north up the east coast in Spring. Over recent years, however, after making landfall from Iceland on the north and north east Scottish coast, many now fly south down the east coast to feed on the abundant sugar beet crop. It is a truly wonderful sight to see the large skeins of Pinkfeet moving south past Spurn Point on the Yorkshire coast in mid to late October. Many skeins of 150+ birds snake low in long straggling lines in the turbulent eddies above the waves.