Dave, Roger and I went to
Eyebrook Reservoir first today as Dave had not had good views of the male
Velvet Scoter. We had a couple of Red
Kite at Cranoe and another three near Blaston on route.
On arrival at Eyebrook
Reservoir we walked to the fishing lodge to find the male Velvet Scoter still
feeding in the same area and again providing superb views. There was a Red Kite observed over the dam
and what was presumably the same bird flew over us as we walked back. On reaching the car we scoped the fields to
the north finding twenty-four Red-legged Partridges, two Buzzards and four more
Red Kites. At the northern end of the
reservoir we found two drake and a red-headed Smew, a pair of Goosander, a
Shelduck and two Dunlin and thirty Golden Plovers flew over.
Drake Velvet Scoter
Drake Velvet Scoter
Red Kite
We drove the short distance to
the north arm at Rutland Water finding a single female Goosander in the
fishponds. From the end of the spit Dave
picked up the female Long-tailed Duck almost immediately but it was some
distance away. He also located the three
Black-necked Grebes towards the north shore but the other two reported
Long-tailed Ducks were remaining illusive.
Dave thought he had one close to the grebes but we couldn’t find it and
he and Roger started to look further afield.
I then had one briefly in my scope and almost immediately what I thought
was the second came up nearby. It then
took several minutes before we were convinced that there were actually two
immature present. Four Buzzards and two
Red Kites were observed over Burley Wood and a third Red Kite was observed over
Barnsdale Wood and we eventually found nine of the Barnacle Geese feeding close
to Dickinson’s Bay and a Curlew flew over.
Cormorant over the north arm
After lunch we went to the
centre where Ken joined us. There were a
couple of Dunlin and a Snipe amongst the flock of Lapwing and circa sixty
Golden Plover flew over. Pintail were
still quite numerous on the lagoon and I counted forty-nine, although there
were probably more.
As we walked towards lagoon
three we found a party of birds feeding in the alders behind lagoon two and on
close inspection there were ten Goldfinch, nine Siskin and two Lesser Redpoll.
On reaching shoveler hide on
lagoon three we soon found four Smew, an immature male and three red-heads and
Roger then found an adult male. There
were three drake Pintail but little else despite the water levels looking
good. We decided to go to smew hide on lagoon
two, which produced very little and so we called at buzzard hide on lagoon
three. This was more productive with a
Green Sandpiper and Redshank coming close to the hide on occasions and there
also close but brief views of a Water Rail.
The Water Rail appeared a little further away when it spent some considerable
time feeding on an exposed island. Both
the adult and immature male Smew and two of the red-heads were visible on
occasions and a Kingfisher flashed in front of the hide.
Gadwall over lagoon three
Drake Smew
Lapwing on lagoon three
Redshank on lagoon three
Redshank on lagoon three
Green Sandpiper on lagoon three
Green Sandpiper on lagoon three
Green Sandpiper on lagoon three
A brief visit to sandpiper
hide on lagoon four produced just two Shelduck and so we returned to the
centre. The weather had now taken a turn
for the worse with quite a strong south-westerly wind and grey skies and a
threat of rain. Seven Curlew flew in but
didn’t stay too long and there were five male and two brown-headed Goosander
now on the lagoon and a Water Rail was seen briefly. We kept a lookout for the Barn Owl in the
nest box but it didn’t appear and it either wasn’t still using it as roost or
felt the weather was not to its liking. As
the light was beginning to fade quite quickly we called it a day.
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