A day’s birding in Leicestershire and Rutland - April 30, 2012

I went to Beacon Hill in search of Tree Pipit, which is one of the few places they can now been found in Leicestershire and Rutland.  I walked around the top of the summit and then east to the bottom before returning to the car park.  I found three singing Tree Pipit and there were plenty of Willow Warblers with a few Blackcaps and Chiffchaffs.  I also heard my second Cuckoo of the year but the bird was only heard on the one occasion.  As I made a final trip to the summit I found two females, one clearly a female but the other flew from out of the sun and I couldn’t re-find it.

 Meadow Pipit

Willow Warbler

I returned home where I met Roger and we then both went to Eye Brook Reservoir where we had a first Lesser Whitethroats of the year.  There was also two Oystercatcher, a Common Sandpiper and fourteen Common Terns.  The reservoir is now full with water levels much higher than I have seen for a while.

Red-legged Partridge

From Eye Brook Reservoir we went to the Egleton Reserve at Rutland Water and after some lunch walked to lagoon four.

We saw our first Garden Warbler of the year close to osprey hide but there was no sign of the Turtle Doves today.  The three Lapwing chicks seen on island ten on Saturday had remarkably survived the atrocious weather yesterday being observed just left of the hide.  There were two Avocets sitting tight on island nine and at least another five were scattered around the lagoon.  Only five Dunlin were observed and just the one Ringed Plover was observed sitting on eggs on island ten and a Common Sandpiper was seen close to the Dunlin.

 Lapwing on lagoon four

 Lapwing chick on lagoon four

 Lapwing over lagoon four

  Lapwing over lagoon four

Willow Warbler at the back of lagoon two

Lagoon three produced to super summer plumage Little Gull and at least seven Black Terns.  Whilst in the hide the Reserve Manager, Tim Appleton, called to inform me that the Little Tern present yesterday was in the fishponds.  Having had reasonable views of one of the Little Gulls and Black Terns, we walked back tot he centre and drove to the north arm.

We soon found the Little Tern feeding above the fishponds, although it kept disappearing deeper into the ponds.  There was also three superb summer plumage Bar-tailed Godwits feeding in the north arm but with little else we went to Hambleton Wood and hopefully the Nightingale.

As we approached the area the Nightingale could be heard singing and we managed brief views but there appears to be just one bird so far this year and I wonder if this is a species we could lose in the near future.

We were on our way back to the centre when a tweet from Tim indicating that there were two Whinchats with eleven Wheatears near the sailing club.  We drove along the cycle track where we saw Matthew who informed us that the Whinchat’s were with a Wheatear close to the shore.  We eventually saw three superb males and the male Wheatear appeared to dwarf the Whinchats was clearly a superb male Greenland Wheatear.  As we drove back we scanned the shore and found another eleven Wheatears and they were all probably Greenland with the males looking superb.

Another excellent day’s birding at Rutland Water, how lucky we are to have this magnificent reserve close to home.