It had been a pretty miserable
day yesterday but there had been some good birds in the counties and I set off
for Eyebrook Reservoir with some expectation.
A Green Woodpecker flew up from the side of the road as I entered
Slawston but as usual there was no sign of the Little Owls along the entrance
road to the reservoir.
When I reached the fence of
the Leicestershire bank David there and had been to the southern end and had
seen Ringed Plover, Common Sandpiper and Green Sandpiper but nothing else. I scanned the mud and found a Little Ringed
Plover with several Ringed Plovers and there was also a single adult Dunlin. I had a message on my phone from Malcolm, who
was watching from the Rutland bank and on calling him back he said there were
three Mandarin from the bridge and six Ruff on the Leicestershire bank. We scanned the bank and soon found the six
Ruff and then moved off to the bridge and hopefully the Mandarin. However another birder at the bridge informed
us that they had flown up stream about twenty minutes ago. As we were scanning over the bridge the other
birder said is that the Garganey and after following his directions I was soon
watching a Garganey and there was a Green Sandpiper nearby and shortly
afterwards an Osprey flew over carrying a good sized fish. We eventually moved along the Rutland bank
and looked back towards the inlet where we found two juvenile Shelduck and
thirteen Ringed Plovers but with little else we moved off to the north arm at
Rutland Water.
Whilst waiting for David to
arrive I had a Kestrel over the fishponds but there was very little else. When David arrived we walked down towards the
point finding four Common Sandpipers and three Yellow Wagtails on the bund and
seven Curlews and a Redshank on the north shore. We continued on and viewed the point for the
field but there were just three Dunlin and so we walked further into the field
and found two Ruff and a Wood Sandpiper in the first bay. I picked up a Raven whilst scanning Burley
Wood and then we added two Red Kites, at least six Buzzards and two Ospreys
over the Wood. Roger then arrived who
had seen the Garganey at Eyebrook Reservoir but the Little Terns present
yesterday at Cropston Reservoir had moved on.
There had been a drake Common Scoter, a Knot, a Turnstone and a Little
Gull in the north arm yesterday but they also appeared to have moved on. The Wood Sandpiper had moved some distance to
a bay near the fisherman’s car park and whilst Roger walked around to get
reasonable views we had two more Raven right over our heads.
David called it a day and I
saw very little else whilst I waited for Roger to come back. I called Malcolm to let him know about the
Wood Sandpiper, has he hadn’t seen it earlier.
He was on the Egleton Reserve and said he thought he might have had some
Black Terns in South Arm Three but they were very distant and it wasn't
certain. When Roger got back we went to
the Old Hall to view the south arm. The drop
in the water level was more apparent here and there was considerably more
exposed shore line but surprisingly no waders.
We scanned the area for the Black Terns but could only find Common Terns
initially but I then picked up a Black Tern over the far side and eventually
managed to count thirteen.
Adult and juvenile Common Terns in the south arm
Juvenile Common Terns in the south arm
We went back to the north arm
to collect Roger’s car before going to Egleton for an early lunch. We were a bit uncertain what to do during the
afternoon as the reports from the reserve were a bit sparse but as a Water Rail
had been seen on lagoon three we headed off to Shoveler hide. As we approached the hide we had brief views
of a Chiffchaff but had seen very little else on route. There were several other birders in the hide
who had seen a Hobby and several Green Sandpipers. We found four Green Sandpipers and there were
six Common Terns over the lagoon and we had brief views of two Reed
Warblers. Despite a lengthy stay in the
hide there was no sign of the hoped for Water Rail and so we moved off to
lagoon four.
Green Sandpiper over lagoon three
We felt that Dunlin hide was
the better bet to get better views of the gulls and there were nine
Yellow-legged Gulls amongst the more numerous Black-headed and Great
Black-backed Gulls with small numbers of both Common and Lesser Black-backed
Gulls and we also found a single Herring Gull.
As we scanned the islands I noticed a couple of Dunlin running and then
Roger picked up a party of circa fifteen waders in flight, which he thought
were Dunlin but I didn’t get on then and he lost them. We couldn’t find the two Dunlin I had seen
and presumably they had flown off but there were three Little Ringed Plovers
and eighteen Ringed Plovers on the lagoon and a Common Sandpiper flew by the
hide. An Osprey was observed eating a
fish on one of the islands and was seen later on one of the perches and there
was a second bird high over Burley Wood.
Osprey with fish
Osprey with fish
We went back to the centre
where Roger found a Snipe on lagoon one and I then found a couple of Dunlin
just after he had left.
As it was still quite early I
decided to call at Eyebrook Reservoir on route home and met up with Malcolm on
the bridge. I had further views of the
Garganey and we also found a couple of Curlew, two Greenshanks, a Green
Sandpiper and a Redshank. We drove around
to the fence and whilst scanning I heard a Whimbrel calling, which was clearly
not too far away but we couldn’t locate and it eventually stopped calling. Richard then arrived telling us that there
were five Wood Sandpipers that could be seen from the road in the last bay. We drove and parked up and found four Wood
Sandpipers and three Common Sandpipers almost straight away but apparently the
fifth had flown off just before we arrived.
I took a few record shots of the four birds and was considering going
when Malcolm found the fifth, which had appeared from the right and obviously
hadn’t flown too far earlier. Five
together in the counties is quite exceptional and it may well be the first
occurrence at Eyebrook Reservoir.
Four of the five Wood Sandpipers
I was feeling a little
disappointed earlier when all of yesterday’s good birds appeared to have gone
but after recording eighty-one species during the day and finishing with five
Wood Sandpipers it was suddenly a good day.
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