Wow, Rutland Water

The plan was to scooch down to Rutland to finally bag one of the many Cattle Egrets in the country these days, by the end of a very long day we'd scored a list of 81 species and some memorable views - this despite missing out several hides and the Manton Bay area.

Big surprise was the new lagoon on the north side of Egleton Reserve, even googling after the visit I find very little online to cover quite what an interesting development it is. Being Rutland it's another big area of water with islands and scrapes that are an obvious magnet for all kinds of waders, and crowning glory of this achievement is an Osprey platform with attending bird. To give an idea of what it's already getting we saw Sanderling, Sandwich Tern and Avocet on or around that lagoon (gales over the last few days certainly helped with that). At one point the two Avocets mobbed the Osprey, which really underlines two of the big successes in British bird conservation over the last couple of decades. Who'd have imagined that even 15 years ago?

On other lagoons, three Black Terns, a pair of summer plumage Black-necked Grebes, and dozens of Hobbies hawking high and low, are all birds to make any day. Early evening a Cuckoo finally showed itself after teasing with distant calls all day long.

Shouldn't forget the reason we travelled in the first place, the Cattle Egret. Always kind of distant, invariably gorgeous, and yes it was among the cows (substituting for the elephants and rhinos of Africa).

An apparently plastic* Ruddy Shelduck hybrid raised and disappointed hopes, and yet what a richly coloured bird nonetheless.

Get thee to Rutland!Osprey nidifying...

...Hobby... flying.

Ruddy/Cape/Egyptian Goose/Shelduck thing

Cattle Egret

Plus, a bonus video, shot from a good distance...




*plastic - noun, slang: A wild bird of dubious origin, usually an escapee from an ornamental wildfowl collection.

Flying Entry

Big update soon about my holiday away in NW Wales, but for now just a few local notes. Seems a while ago now (three weeks) that I scored with Black Tern back on the local patch at King's Mill Reservoir. This year they've been just about everywhere and seen by just about everyone, so I'm glad I got mine!
Lovely, elegant birds in summer plumage, and very graceful they are too hawking for insects at the surface waters. Their dark tones, relative small size, I don't mind admitting it took a minute or two of sifting through the large hirundine flock to pick out our bird.
It scored well with the girlfriend test, she was well impressed.

Last night we had a unsuccessful forray to Budby Common in search of Nightjar. We heard them all right, at least two, probably three chirring after 10pm, that was the extent of it though. What did show were Woodcock, we more than a dozen sightings of them roding above the treelines with that strange croaking and hiccupping display call. Can't say I'm disappointed after that!
We shall return though, possibly for Nottinghamshire Birdwatchers' Nightjar walk on June 20th.

So stories and pictures from Wales next time...