The overnight rain had ceased
as I left home and headed for Eyebrook Reservoir, which I approached from the
north. There was no sign of the Little
Owl as I approached the reservoir and I stopped and parked first near the inlet
bridge. There were a couple of Little
Egrets in the stream and a Kingfisher was perched near the willow on the edge
of the stream. The plantation to the
north of the bridge was fairly quite with just a few Fieldfares being the
highlight but there was a couple of Red Kites over the field to the east of the
bridge, a single Buzzard over the road just to the west and two more Buzzards
between the bridge and the Stoke Dry car park.
I drove further around on the
Rutland bank to view the inlet where a further rise in the water level had
resulted in it covering all the exposed mud.
Consequently the only waders were several hundred Lapwings. There was a fair sized concentration of gulls
on the water, mainly Common but also good numbers Black-headed and few Herring
and a single Lesser Black-backed. The
light looking out onto the reservoir was poor as the sun was trying to break
through and it was reflecting off the water but I did manage to find a single
Shelduck amongst the gulls and a single Goldeneye amongst the more common wildfowl.
With the light making viewing
difficult I headed off to the Lyndon Reserve at Rutland Water and after parking
walked through the gate to view the feeding station. As usual there were plenty of Blue Tits
visiting along with two Coal Tits and there were also several Chaffinches,
three Greenfinches and a single Goldfinch.
I decided to head to Waders Scrape Hide to check out Manton Bay seeing a
Little Egret in the bay as I set off.
There were small numbers of Fieldfare and Redwing today as I walked
along the path but there were plenty of Blackbirds and I also saw several
Goldcrest and three Bullfinches before reaching the path to the hide.
The water in the bay was still
much higher than the reservoir and still unsuitable for waders but there were
at least four Little Egrets in the bay and I could see a fifth on the bund
across Heron Bay. There was also four
Egyptian Geese, good numbers of Wigeon and Teal in the bay with smaller numbers
of Shoveler, Tufted Duck and Goldeneye.
As I walked back towards the
centre a party of circa ten Siskin were observed in flight and on reaching the
centre there was now a Marsh Tit and four Tree Sparrows on the feeders. Looking out towards Gadwall Hide I found one
of the Great White Egrets and a Little Egret.
There was news of a probable
Black-throated Diver with the Great Northern Diver off Whitwell yesterday and I
therefore made this my next port of call.
The car park near the restaurant was closed and so I had to park in the
main car park and walk through the closed car park to view the main water. I noticed another birder on the shoreline as
I walked across the car park and when I reached the area found Ben, Brian,
Roger and Terry all viewing the area.
They had found three Great Northern Divers, two of which were actually
in Whitwell Creek with the third out on the Main Water and a little closer to
the dam. They got me on to all three of
the divers but they were all actively feeding and were only showing briefly
between divers. There was no sign of
yesterday’s probable Black-throated Diver, which we assumed might have been one
of the Great Northern but a Red Kite and Sparrowhawk flew over and there were
ten Little Grebes in the creek.
Terry had left just after I
arrived and eventually we all headed off to the north arm to look for the
wintering grebes. After parking we
walked down towards the end of the spit and Ben and I scanned the northern
section whilst Brian and Roger continued on to view the area towards the
tower. There was no sign of anything out
of the ordinary and so I went to join the Brian and Roger only to be called
back by Ben who had found a Black-tailed Godwit on the northern shore amongst
the gulls. When we joined Briand and
Roger they had located the two Black-necked Grebes and shortly afterwards I
found the Slavonian Grebes off the fisherman’s car park and there were three
Redshanks in the bay to our right. I
called Terry to see if he had located the birds and he had seen them form the
Fisherman’s car park and had also probably had the Red-necked Grebe but it was
even further down the arm. Brian picked
up a Peregrine over the fishponds and we viewed the fishponds as we walked back
where there were three male and a single female Goosander.
Brian and Roger headed off to
Egleton and Ben set off for home whilst I stayed to have my lunch in the
shelter of the trees. When I got to the
car park at Egleton Briand and Roger was just finishing their lunch and we all
went to the Bird Watching Centre to view Lagoon One. The recent rains had raised the level of
water on the lagoon but there were still ten Dunlin on the long island and I
counted fifty-nine Pintail with another seven visible on Lagoon Two. Roger then had a purple patch finding a Curlew
in the meadow, two Jays on the Wet Meadow and a male and female Stonechat
towards Mallard Hide and there was also what was probably the second Great
White Egret, a Little Egret on the lagoon and five more Curlew flew over.
Brian and Roger decide to head
off to Eyebrook Reservoir whilst I went to view the northern lagoons. I met Terry coming back who had seen very
little except for thirty to forty Golden Plover and two Dunlin on Lagoon
Four. After a brief chat I continued on
seeing very little before reaching Sandpiper Hide on Lagoon Four. When I opened the flap most of the birds were
in flight but when they eventually came down I counted thirty-seven Golden
Plovers but other than five Shelduck there was little else and I moved to
Shoveler Hide on Lagoon Three.
I saw very little from the
hide and fared no better from Redshank Hide and so continued back to the car
park. Gerry was now back with me and we
stopped until it was almost dark looking out over the meadow with the owl box
in, hoping for a Barn Owl but other than a few Redwing flying over we saw
nothing else and we eventually called it a day.
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