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Mere Sands Wood Nature Reserve is a reserve of some 100 acres of lakes, woodland and heaths, maintained and managed by the Lancashire Wildlife Trust. Like most other nature reserves in Britain, this too was well maintained, had a wonderful visitor centre with very friendly persons manning it, who were bird watchers and naturalists themselves, and different paths spread across the reserve for people to walk through and enjoy all that the reserve had to offer. And most of the paths were accessible to wheelchair users too. It is, indeed, amazing to see how well the people care about whatever little wildlife they have. I took a train from Liverpool Central at 8.30AM, and changing trains at Ormskirk, alighted at Rufford, and walked 30 minutes to reach the reserve. After spending 6 hours there, I walked back to the Rufford train station and taking the same route back, reached Liverpool by 7.00pm. Weather was not very favourable though. In the morning there were random showers, and the afternoon remained dry, though not very sunny. I did have difficulty with many of the species seen there, but the people at the visitor centre helped me out, and also with great enthusiasm took me to a hide to show a sparrowhawk perched on a distant tree. The reserve had excellent hides near lakes, providing good facility to observe the birds in the lake and surroundings. There weren't many people going around the reserve, but who ever was there, was keenly interested in birds and outdoors, as I found out. The Great Spotted Woodpecker is one of the specialities at the reserve, but I wasn't lucky enough to see it. There were tawny owls too. The highlight was the Sparrowhawk, thanks to the guy at the visitor centre, but the predator bird was perched too far away across a lake, that the sighting was not a very clear one. However, I was lucky to see a Buzzard circling low over a farmland, during the walk back to Rufford. Birds Seen & Identified: Blackbird Bullfinch Buzzard Canada Geese Chaffinch Coal Tit Common Coot Great Crested Grebe Greenfinch Grey Heron Herring Gull Jackdaw Lapwing Little Grebe Magpie Mallard Moorhen Mute Swan Pheasant Robin Shelduck Sparrowhawk Tufted Duck Woodpigeon Written: April 17, 2004