The last few days....

Will try not to waffle today and keep things nice and summary-ish

Wednesday 7th September.

Whilst driving from Northampton to Leicester I gave many of the reservoirs en-route a look over in the hope of picking up some weak at the wings seabird that had been inadvertantly blown off course and into the not very sea-ish midlands. No such luck however with Pitsford, Hollowell, Ravensthorpe, Naseby, Welford and Saddington reservoirs all seemingly devoid of the Gannets, Skuas, Puffins and Crested Auklets that i'd been dreaming of. Nevermind.

Thursday 8th September.

Took Amy to Egleton reserve at Rutland for the first time and just visited the hides on the right hand side. I say "just" - it still must be close to a dozen hides spread over about 3-4 miles of path. Much the same birds were seen as my visit to Rutland in the previous blog post so I won't blather on and on about that but 2 Curlew Sandpipers from Goldeneye hide were nice and Lagoon 6 went one better by having no birds on it at all. Another tale of woe is forthcoming here so if you're tired of my complaining about not seeing stuff scroll down to the write up for today. Quickly. Anyway upon leaving the reserve at about 6pm I drove towards Northampton instead of Leicester as thats where we were heading and thus missed the usual Eyebrook reservoir detour on the way home. If I had went and had a shufty at Eyebrook or had the twitter phone alerts thing I thought I had set up worked I would have seen a Manx Shearwater. Yes, albeit an exhausted individual that was clearly not the happiest of campers and would be found deceased the next morning (today) which wouldn't have been nice viewing but it would at least have been a county tick. So in the last few weeks its been:
Cattle Egret - ran a merry dance around hooded birder.
Red necked Phalarope - was cruising around Lag 4 whilst I sat 500yards away in Shoveler hide, unaware.
Manx Shearwater - sent telepathic signals telling me to drive to Northampton instead and then sabotaged the twitter network. And then died.
So all in all I believe i'm just wank at this county rare game!

here, have a blurry Sparrowhawk from Rutland instead of a blurry Shearwater.

Friday 9th September

Did a smaller repeat of Wednesdays game early this afternoon, visiting Naseby, Welford and Saddington reservoirs on the hunt for more near death seabirds to poke cameras at and predictably I didn't see any. Welford and Saddington were both disappointing but Naseby was the unexpected jewel in the crown with a nice haul of waders. This was unexpected due to the fact that my history with Naseby isn't good: despite many visits at different times of year I almost always see absolutely nothing of note. So it makes me wonder why I bother driving the mile or so down a gravel track just to get to a place that doesnt have any birds to look at. Today I broke my Naseby voodoo in spectacular style with a nice haul of small waders present in the small bay close to the car park and some other larger beasts on the far shores. After a couple of scans, i'd tallied 6 Dunlin, 1 juv. Curlew Sandpiper, 3 Ruff, 2 Greenshank and 12+ Ringed Plover - all of which bar the Greenshank were site ticks! Yes, I'd never even seen a Ringed Plover at Naseby before!

Curlew Sand and a couple of Plovers.

On the way home I struck lucky and spied a familiar looking blob in a tree that had me slamming on the brakes and turning around for a second look. I was rewarded with this little fellow.

"im a tree, honest"

Who after a few minutes decided I wasn't so much of a threat and came out for a better look:

after 15 or so minutes watching this chap (he/she didn't take their eyes off me the whole time I was there) I left him/her to it and went home delighted with my best to date owl images!

Walking Walking Walking

I have a feeling this will end up as a rather long post.... feel free to let your mind wander, look at the photos only and not to read my waffling.

**Disclaimer** I didn't see the Rn phalarope at Rutland yesterday and I do not wish to mention it any further than saying I looked at Lagoon 4, thought it looked dead and chose not to carry on round to Plover hide. Woe is me, would have been a life tick.

Anyway yesterday (4th sept) I found myself at Eyebrook at 6am again but different to last time I wasn't hunting for Cattle Egret, I was merely stopping off there en-route to Rutland for a day birding there. This turned out to be a shorter than usual stopover with very little present to divert my attention. Not one single wader was seen whilst I was there...actually tell a lie there was a single Lapwing on the far bank. But when you consider that there is usually a few hundred Lapwing at Eyebrook things become concerning.....all I can think of is perhaps a fox was worrying the roosting waders in the night. The lack of waders didn't put off the game of Partridge herding though, yesterday was particularly productive....lookie:

After this I made my way over to Egleton, stopping briefly at Manton Bridge where 3 Ospreys were immediately spotted, 1 with a large fish which was possibly a carp/bream and large amounts of waders infront of the Lyndon hides but too far away to identify properly. I resolved to visit the hides at Lyndon later for a better look and made my way to Egleton reserve to fulfil my intention of visiting the new hides that had been open a while and to visit the now re-open Heron and Wigeon hides.
I of course stopped in the hides on the way to the new lagoons and notable sightings included 5 Ruff and a Black-tailed Godwit on Lagoon 1, a Treecreeper in with the tit/warbler flock outside Mallard hide and 3 Green Sandpipers on the new wet meadow (Snipe Hide).

After a quick look in Harrier hide where nothing new was seen except Stock Dove for the day list and a Fox that scared the shit out of everything I moved onto the new path that leads towards the new hides.

Filbert.

So Tern hide on the newly created Lagoon 6 was graced by the Hooded birder for the first time and was unfortunately a bit shit with only a Heron seen (and then a Black Headed Gull on the way back past later) on the whole lagoon but this isn't surprising considering the age of the Lagoon and will undoubtedly improve with age. Here's the view from tern hide.

Poor today but in future this nearby island should provide superb views of nesting Terns and Plovers.

As always with Rutland there is so much to cover and not enough time to do it in so I didn't linger here and moved on round the new path towards the new Kingfisher hide adding Green Woodpecker and Red Kite to the day list at this juncture. This path currently offers a superb overview of the newly created Lagoon 8 - along with tantalising views across to lagoons 5 & 7 which aren't open to the public yet and I must say the team at Rutland have done a cracking job. It's like having a whole new reserve added onto an already enormous one! Less talking more pictures.

view of Lagoon 8

Lagoon 8 from Kingfisher hide

Kingfisher hide produced 4 Blackwits over, a couple more Greenshank, a few Lapwing and the first Common Terns of the day - 1 adult and 4 juveniles seen here and over nearby Heron bay. Kingfisher hide looks even more promising than Tern because this Lagoon is somewhat larger and will almost certainly attract good birds to it although I do have beef with the name of the hide. Kingfisher? When I think of the hides at Rutland this one doesnt immediately jump out at me as being likely to produce Kingfisher more than others, this one has no banks and not even any perching poles! Wigeon hide, a mere stones throw away produced a Kingfisher, perched on a pole, minutes after I left Kingfisher hide which further confirmed my view and made Kingfisher hide look a right tit. Heron bays biggest surprise however was the discovery of a photographer in Heron hide. I had not seen another soul for the couple of hours I'd been on the reserve and found all other hides unoccupied so imagine my surprise when entering one of the more remote hides on the reserve and finding a bloke spread out in there like it was his lounge! A couple more Green sands and Greenshank were on offer too in this area and another Treecreeper was spotted in the small copse where the hides are situated.

With it starting to rain as I walked towards back towards the rest of the reserve I made the decision to attempt to escape the worst of it in the woodland surrounding lax hill - this ploy didnt really work and left me sheltering in Robin hide for the best part of an hour. The feeding station here isn't maintained during the summer months but that didnt put off the birds with another large tit/warbler flock operating in this area that included my 3rd (and best ever haul) Treecreeper of the day, at least two Nuthatch, a juvenile  Greater spotted Woodpecker, a few Goldcrest, brief views of 2 Jay and what I think was a Lesser Whitethroat that gave short glimpses only.

After the rain eased I moved back towards the visitors center visting Goldeneye, Gadwall and Fieldfare hides on the way where large amounts of ducks were in evidence, the best of which being a handful of moulting Pintail - my first of the autumn. A presumed adult female Peregrine flew over at this point too.

Gulls and 2x Pintail

After making my way back to the center I carried on over to the other side of the reserve, being briefly entertained by a Hobby hunting dragonflies over Lagoon 2 before being attacked and viciously persued by the Blackwit from Lagoon 1.

As previously mentioned Lagoon 4 didn't look promising from Dunlin hide so I quickly moved onto Shoveler hide on Lagoon 3 which was also quiet bar a couple of Green Sands so I moved along towards Smew and Lapwing hides which thankfully delivered and produced another Kingfisher and several more waders which behaved nicely and offered decent photographic opportunities that even I couldn't bodge.

Ruffs from Lapwing hide

Green Sandpiper from Smew Hide

After this photography binge I left Egleton and began the trek from Lyndon car park down the Shallow Water Hide to look at the waders - honestly that place should employ sherpas to accompany weary birders on that fucking mission! The walk was worth it however with waders in abundance at my destination. My Ruff count peaked at 34 birds whilst I was there, more than I'd ever seen together! The stars of the show however were 4 Curlew Sandpipers mixed in with the flock of 10 Dunlin. Other waders about included Common Sandpiper, Redshank and two Curlew along with a good flock of juvenile Yellow Wagtail - about 10-12 birds present.

Ruffians

L to R: Dunlin, Curlew Sand, Curlew Sand, R.Plover (foreground), Dunlin

The Ospreys were also on view of course with the three birds that i'd seen earlier in the day now much closer from the hide. So in true Hooded birder shit photograph style I attempted to mimic the inspiring shots you see of the Ospreys on the nest platform with the big country house in the background.....

Mines clearly much better.

After the wader fest at Lyndon I headed home via Eyebrook to see if any waders had turned up and was rewarded with two more Ruff, a Greenshank and a Black tailed Godwit that allowed itself to be photographed by yours truly

Blackwit

Greenshank

Combo

And that was that. 79 species of bird on the day list but no Phalarope.....and I was horrifically close to it in Shoveler hide all along without knowing it was there. Testicles.


5th September
Woke up this morning with my twitching pants on - if the Phalarope was resighted I was there! I did consider a first light, hunt the fucker myself arrangement but after the fiasco of attempting that with Cattle Egret the other week I decided to pass this time. And it hasn't been seen today so I win. With the desire to twitch something burning deeply I ventured out to Frolesworth with the intention of year ticking the two Whinchat that have been sighted there over the past couple of days. And thankfully the little buggers didnt disappoint and were fairly easy to track down once I got to their favoured horse paddock and was joined by a keen observer.

Keen observer

Awesome photo of a Whinchat

21st and 22nd August. Wild egret chase

I have developed a new nemesis over the last couple of days. And that nemesis is the Cattle Egret, Bubulcus ibis. One turned up at Eyebrook at a similar time to this last year and I missed it, so when one had been reported on Saturday I made my way over early on Sunday afternoon to try and see the beast. Made a rookie manoeuvre from the off in wearing the trademark hoodie - it was absolutely roasting. Now a normal person could have fixed this by simply removing the offending item of clothing but no such luck for me, In my wisdom I hadn't worn a shirt underneath and rather than expose my doughy physique to the world I cooked. Slowly.  Upon arriving it was patently obvious that the bird wasn't in the area it had been reported, and over the next two hours it became even clearer that the bird wasn't present anywhere, with it last being seen fucking off high Northwards. Bugger. A few decent birdies such as 7 Ruff, 2 Greenshank and half a dozen juvenile Yellow Wagtail (there were two Whinchat seen with the wagtails earlier in the day, but I didn't pick them out) did little to compensate. So I went home to watch the cricket in the end. And then saw that the Cattle Egret had returned to Eyebrook. What a bastard. So plans were made for Monday. Oh and I saw a Weasel at Great Easton whilst I was roaming around looking for cows.

22nd August
And so I found myself at the viewing area near the island bright and early at 6am this morning. Sightings of Little Owl, Muntjac deer and Bat sp. en route to the site made for a good start, made all the more better by a group of 3, closely followed by a group of 2 Egrets flying straight over my head within seconds of arrival and landing in the area the Cattle Egret had been seen last the night before. All 5 turned out to be Little Egret. The dirty rotters. A pair of Hobby briefly caused what may have been classed as pleasure but it was mainly annoyance with the unpredicatable nature (and downright indecency) of the Egret. Even worse my Ruff count peaked at 6 birds today and I only saw 1 Greenshank. A Green Sandpiper was added to the day list here though.
Being at Eyebrook early in the morning is always enjoyable but after a couple of hours I got bored with not seeing the Egret and became confident that i'd looked pretty damn thoroughly for it and it was almost definitely not present. And so I made my way over to Ketton quarry with the intention of satisfying the Llama and finding a real, live adder for my Leicestershire reptile list. Although its not an ideal time of year for adder I was reasonably confident of a sighting as Ketton is adder-tastic and it was a lovely warm, sunny day when I arrived on site shortly before 9am - theoretically perfect for a basking snake. In practice however no snakes were seen. Not one. I was on site for the best part of 3 hours, enjoying the sunshine and the cacophany of woodland bird song belting out from the surronding area. I did find a skin though. This one was about 2 feet long.

The visit wasn't totally devoid of reptiles however, with many many Common Lizards in evidence. Trying to get a close look (or a photo for that matter) of these little devils is a challenge though as they rarely sit still! I did see one enormous individual though, he/she was huge!


Spot the lizard


Other good stuff seen whilst at Ketton included two flyover Raven, Jay, Nuthatch, Treecreeper, Lesser Whitethroat, the two commoner Woodpeckers and what were my best ever views of a Stoat. It made its way down the side of the "ampitheatre", stalked and then chased a couple of rabbits and then promptly sat on a flat rock and stared at me (I was only about 15 feet away) for what seemed like an age although it was probably only a few seconds. As soon as I moved (in this case to attempt a photo) though it shifted sharpish and wasn't seen again!

Eventually, I left Ketton at around midday and after a quick scan of Eyebrook on the way, went home and watched England be well good at cricket. Oh, and the Egret turned up at Burley Fishponds this evening. The turd.

Edit: Oh and a juv. Blackcap was sighted in the garden rare bush on Sunday. Bonanza.