As I made my way to Rutland Water to assist with WeBS count there were
four Common Buzzard soaring over the hill just west of Cranoe.
I arrived at the Volunteer’s Training Centre just after Joe had arrived
and opened the gates and switched off the alarm. Terry and my co-counter today, Jonathon Eames
had already arrived. Jonathon was a
young local birder back in the seventies and now manages a reserve in Cambodia
and it must have been over thirty years since our last encounter, which I
believe was on the beach at Cley.
We went into the centre and when the rest of the team had assembled
Jonathan and I set off to count South Arm Three. After parking near the Old Hall, we walked
east to view the bay near the Old Hall where we found a few Gadwall, Mallard
and Eurasian Teal and three Egyptian Geese.
As we walked back towards the cattle grid we counted what was between us
and the now exposed island. There were
two Common Ringed Plover and three Dunlin on the near shore and Mute Swan,
Northern Shoveler; Gadwall; Mallard, Eurasian Teal and Tufted Duck between us
and the island.
As we walked further along the shore it became evident that counting from
the Green Bank wouldn't be easy due to the fresh south-west wind and most birds
being rather distant and so we decided to go on the reserve and count from the
hides.
We drove by the Volunteer’s Training Centre and parked near the path
leading to Lapwing Hide. We called at
Crake Hide and counted what was in the small creek that included a Common Snipe
and a Eurasian Reed Warbler before going to Lapwing Hide.
Once in Lapwing Hide we could see that there were plenty of birds to
count and we each took species to count between Lagoon Three bund and Brown’s
Island. The most numerous were Eurasian
Coot and Tufted Duck but there were also Northern Shoveler, Gadwall; Eurasian
Wigeon; Mallard and Great Crested Grebe and there was also seven Red-crested
Pochard and a single Common Pochard.
Having finished counting the area we went back to the car and drove to
the other side of the reserve and parked near Fieldfare Hide. From the hide there were Northern Shoveler;
Gadwall; Eurasian Wigeon; Mallard; Eurasian Teal; Tufted Duck and Great Crested
Grebe and five Northern Pintail. There
was also a Common Snipe and two Common Redshanks, which were the first I had
seen hear in some time.
Having finished we walked to Gadwall Hide where I was hoping we could finish
off South Arm Three. There were fewer
birds here and we were soon walking back to the car. Worthy of note were the number of Great
Crested Grebes we had counted with a final tally of 239, which on its own would
be an excellent number for the reservoir, but there are also good numbers in
the North Arm and it will be interesting to see the final count, which could be
close to 500.
We drove back along the track and parked near Tern Hide before walking to
Harrier Hide to begin the count on Lagoon One.
There wasn’t a great number of wildfowl visible from Harrier Hide but we
did find a juvenile Ruff, two Green Sandpiper and a Common Greenshank. A Eurasian Hobby also performed well as it
hunted over the lagoon and surrounding meadow and a juvenile Western Marsh
Harrier was also observed.
As we drove around the track heading back to the centre we had a Common
Kestrel near the 360 Hide and after parking we went into the centre to complete
the count. There was another 103
Eurasian Coot on the lagoon and a count of ninety-two Mallard was noteworthy
but just four Tufted Duck was rather a surprise. There were also twenty-four Northern Shoveler
and two Northern Pintail and an adult Ruff and a Common Sandpiper were also
seen.
With the count completed I drove Jonathan back to the Volunteer’s
Training Centre and whilst we were having a coffee we had two Western Marsh
Harriers, two Common Buzzard and three Eurasian Hobbies over the Lagoon Three
area.
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