I decided to have another trip to the Egleton Reserve for another try for the Water Rail. I took my normal route through the Little Owl Sites and at last saw a single bird at Little Owl Site No. 8, unfortunately the only bird I saw but at least I saw a bird.
On arrival at Egleton I checked in with David who said he had been on a different route that morning and gone over Lax Hill and had seen virtually nothing.
So I got on my way and headed on my normal route to see what would appear for me. I headed for Redshank Hide and nothing out of the ordinary was evident, so onto both Grebe and Buzzard Hides, again nothing unusual about but the light was getting dire. Having had rain on the trip over I was getting concerned as to keeping the camera dry.
I then walked round to Shoveler hide where again little was showing close by so I headed for Crake hide where I manged some images of a Marsh Harrier, this bird initially just kept showing above the hedge on the embankment between the main Reservoir and Lagoon three, eventually some Corvids pounced on it and for a few seconds it showed slightly better and then departed the area. Later as the light was going but the clouds clearing two Goosanders appeared for a few minutes swimming around the bay at great speed, most of the time with the heads submerged looking for fish.
The water level in the Reservoir is still getting much lower, I tend to forget that even though its been very dull, we have had very little rain. Whilst in Crake Hide I saw two Water Rail hidden well in the reeds.
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Little Owl Site No. 8. Only a single bird but wonderful to see after so many weeks without seeing a single bird.
RUTLAND WATER.
EGLETON RESERVE. 
Marsh Harrier, Crake Hide.
This bird kept flying along the far side of the embankment that encloses Lagoon 3. It hardly was showing above the trees but I'm sure it was hunting.
At this point is was approximately 300 metres away, plus I was struggling with the light.
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Eventually it went slightly higher only then to be attacked by Corvids. |
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By this time the light was going and a little sun was starting to show even if the sun was very low in the sky. This bird was in excess of 200 metres away and I was having to shoot at ISO 5000. |
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After this it went out over Lagoon 3 and didn't make another appearance. |
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Male Goosander, Crake Hide. A pair of the birds and swam around the bay at great speed, mostly as below with the head under water looking for fish. |
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These are a bird I see very little of on the reserve, I think its three years since I saw them last.  After this image I headed back to the car park and home for tea, only four weeks to go and the days start getting longer. Next thing we will have the Ospreys returning.  Here standing in the shallow water having a quick preen, difficult to resist not taking an image. Thank you for your visit, I hope you have enjoyed the visit as much as I did in the getting of the images. We still have our Juvenile Male Barn Owl in the large box. Had a visit to Rutland Water this afternoon, {23rd} my idea being to get some images of the Great Northern Diver and Red-breasted Merganser, both in the area of the dam. The wind hitting me on the dam virtually blew me away. It was impossible to keep still to use the bins and when you picked the camera up, forget it!!!!!!!! After a walk of about 2 miles, I saw nothing worth photographing and if I had it would have been an impossible task. |
