I was back at Rutland Water
this morning to help with the WeBS Count and counted South Arm Three, Lagoon
One and the Wet Meadow with Joe. Before
starting the count, I saw a single Chiffchaff in the hedgerow close to the
Volunteer’s Training Centre.
We started off in South Arm
Three where there was some disturbance from fisherman and many of the Tufted
Duck flew off and looked at as though they came down on Lagoon One. There were ten Little Egrets in the arm along
with a single Great White Egret but the only other bird of note was a
Kingfisher.
When we arrived in the centre
we could see that at least some of the Tufted Duck had dropped onto the lagoon
and I counted over 1400, whilst Joe mopped up the rest of the species but
sixteen Pintail and another Great White Egret were the only birds of note.
We moved to Mallard Hide to
continue the count as it wasn’t easy counting the birds on the long island due
the bright sunlight. The light was
slightly better here but we didn’t have anything of note and moved onto Snipe
Hide on the Wet Meadow.
From Snipe Hide we could see
the back of the long island and added more but only four Snipe were noteworthy
and there was just a few Teal on the Wet Meadow.
Finally, we went to Harrier
Hide to complete the count on both Lagoon One and the Wet Meadow where there
was a single Little Egret and four Buzzards circling between us and
Burley. As we walked back we had another
Buzzard and heard a Curlew and another visit to Mallard Hide allowed us to
identify a duck we had struggled with earlier, which turned out to be just a
Teal and there we saw a female Marsh Harrier from the centre.
After getting back to the
Visitor's Centre I walked back to the Volunteer’s Training Centre but didn’t
see a great deal and after a chat with some of the counters and a coffee I
headed off home. I had a Red Kite near
Egleton and three Little Egrets on Wistow Pool as I drove home.
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