Dave, Roger and I set off for
Eye Brook Reservoir but on arrival the heavens opened, the rain was very
heavy. We decided to continue to go the
Bird Watching Centre at Rutland Water as at least we could remain dry there.
As we arrived in the car park
the rain eased and we were able to get to the centre relatively dry. There were
twelve Little Egrets on the lagoon and we did find two Snipe and a Green
Sandpiper and a Kingfisher appeared briefly but there was little else of note. As the rain eased we set off to sandpiper
hide on lagoon four. There were a few
birds around the badger hide area and we managed to find a Great Spotted
Woodpecker, a female-type Blackcap and a Marsh Tit. I heard a Ringed Plover calling and just afterwards
seventeen flew over us and appeared to head off west and we also saw a Willow
Warbler and Goldcrest.
There appeared to be very
little on lagoon four at first other than seven Little Egrets but patience paid
off as a Hobby passed over and we found two Little Ringed Plovers, eleven
Ringed Plovers, two Dunlin and a Greenshank.
On lagoon three from shoveler
hide there was a Black-necked Grebe close to the hide that was difficult to
see. There was a single Dunlin, five
Ruff, six Snipe, three Black-tailed Godwit and a Green Sandpiper flew in. Lagoon three is usually good for terns and
today was no exception, amongst the thirty plus Common Terns were four Black
Terns and a single juvenile Arctic Tern, which Dave picked out. Are only two Buzzards of the day were
observed over the wood on the northern edge of the lagoon.
I called at crake hide as we
headed to lapwing hide where there was a couple of Green Sandpipers and a
Greenshank. The terns on lagoon three
then rose high and became very vocal and the three Black-tailed Godwits and
Ruff flew over and just afterwards a Sparrowhawk circled above.
We did locate a single
Goldeneye from lapwing hide and Roger found another Pintail but there was no
sign of the female-type Common Scoter present on the previous two visits. Ken had called whilst we were in lapwing hide
and we met him as we walked back to the car park for lunch.
We decided we would visit the
north arm before finishing the day on the Lyndon Reserve. The north produced three Oystercatchers, which
have normally all gone by this time of the year, and a single Greenshank.
On arriving at Lyndon there
were plenty of birds on the feeders, including eighteen Tree Sparrows, when a
Sparrowhawk arrived and crashed into the small bush close to the feeders in
pursuit of the passerines. It didn’t
come out but we catch another glimpse of it after all of the passerines
dispersed but were unsure if its attack had been successful. We walked to shallow water hide where a
single juvenile Osprey and the two adults were still present and there were two
Garganey quite close to the hide. Three
Greenshanks were observed and a Spotted Flycatcher came and sat on the wire
fence close to the hide for several minutes.
We then found a second on the far side of the reservoir just before we
walked back to the centre.
It had been another good days
birding, perhaps not quite as exciting as the last visit, but still very
enjoyable.
No comments:
Post a Comment