A morning at Rutland Water, Rutland - April 19, 2017

I left home and headed for Rutland Water where I was going to help with the monthly WeBS count.  It was a bright sunny start after a sharp overnight frost and consequently it was quite cold but thankfully there was no wind.  There was a Little Egret on Wistow Pool and I had a Red Kite near Stonton Wyville and Kestrel just beyond Cranoe and after passing through Hallaton I flushed a Buzzard from the roadside and there were four more Red Kites over a field as I approached Horninghold and another Kestrel just the other side of the village.

I arrived at Rutland Water and Matt and I were assigned to do South Arm Three and then to liaise Joe to see who was to count Lagoon One.

As usual we started the count from the Old Hall on what was a bright and sunny morning with very little wind but feeling quite cold after the overnight frost.  After a quick but unsuccessful look for the Red-necked Grebe we went to view the bay just west of the Old Hall.  As we started to walk along the path a Sparrowhawk flew through and when we reached the bay we found a Grey Wagtail along with a Pied Wagtail and a couple of Meadow Pipits.  There was a flock of Tufted Duck feeding just off the Old Hall and a few Mallard in the bay but nothing else.  We retraced our steps counting what was close in on the shore before scanning the far shore between Goldeneye Hide and Brown’s Island.  One of the first birds I located was the Red-necked Grebe and there were plenty of birds along the shore including a Shelduck, forty-eight Pintail and a Great White Egret.

Once we had finished counting this section we moved further into the arm to view the western section.  There were thirty-six Red-crested Pochard close to the shore and the area between Brown’s Island and Lapwing Hide was covered in birds, which took quite some time to count.  By far the most numerous species was Coot with a count of over 1900 but there was also Mute Swan, Canada Goose, Greylag Goose, Wigeon, Gadwall, Teal, Mallard, Pintail, Pochard, Tufted Duck, Goldeneye, Great Crested Grebe and Moorhen.  I also found the American Wigeon amongst the flock and there were at least five Little Egrets scattered around the edges.

Andy Mackay had sent out a WhatsApp message that there was a flock of c.120 Pink-footed Geese over Normanton that were moving northwest.  I was hoping we might be lucky and see them pass over Burley, but it wasn’t long afterwards when we picked up the calls of the geese and eventually found them quite high moving west but to the south of us and they had obviously flown due west from Normanton.

Finally, we went to Crake Hide on the reserve to make a final check for any birds we might have missed in the small bay.  We found a few more Moorhen and a Grey Heron tucked into the rocks and also three Water Rails, which made the visit worthwhile.

A call to Joe to check his progress and good news as he had counted all the new lagoons, the Wet Meadow and Lagoon One and so we had finished and went back to the centre to hand in our counts.

Although we had only counted South Arm Three our total count was 3431 and Tim tweeted later that 16551 birds had been counted around the whole reservoir and excellent November count which was possibly due to the very low water levels at present.