Trip reports

Rutland Water Trips Sat 29th- Sun 30th March

Wednesday, 2 April 2008

The weather for the Saturday trip was not very good with heavy rain showers forecast. Passing RAF Wittering on the way up, a lucky few saw a Red Kite taking off from the airfield. Buzzards were showing widely, evidence of their expansion over the last decade.
Arriving at the Egleton Visitors Centre, we headed off to the hides overlooking the lagoons, where duck species were in evidence such as Teal, Pochard, Mallard, Gadwall and Wigeon. The artificial sand bank was doing great business as Sand Martins flew in and out excavating nest holes. After dodging rain showers we drove around to the Lyndon Visitors Centre where both of the Osprey that had arrived back on the previous day were showing.
As we entered the Centre, through the panoramic windows overlooking the water, an Osprey quartered the shallows looking for fish about 20mts away.
It became hard to know where to look as, while the Osprey performed, on a feeding station right in front of the windows, amongst the many Chaffinchs, a lone Brambling scurried around and a few nervous Tree Sparrows darted in and out to feed. We moved onto the Waderscrape, the nearest hide to an active Osprey nest, where one of the Ospreys , having perched up was identified as 08(97) a star breeding male.Our last stop of the day was at the dam area of Rutland Water, where due to the cold wind and rough water, very little was showing so after about 10 minutes of shivering we headed back to the minibus and headed home.
With a better weather forecast for Sunday, we arrived at the dam area to calm water. Out in the reservoir a drake and 3 female Scaup were spotted and to our delight, swam into a small bay in front of us to give us some of the best views ever.On the rocks around the dam a Northern Wheatear was found.
At the Lynden Centre an Osprey was quickly seen flying over Lax hill towards the nest site , so we made our way towards the Waderscrape hide. As we made our way along the road an Osprey flew low overhead calling followed by a second Osprey.
Out in the water opposite the hide, on a perching post rested the 2 Ospreys, showing the size difference between male and female, this being confirmed a few minutes later when the smaller male mated with the female. It was confirmed later when the leg rings could be read, that the pair were last years successful breeding pair, the female not expected back for a few weeks.
The pair later entertained us by trying to evict a Canada Goose from their nest by stooping from a height
and it's talons missing the Goose by inches.
We dragged ourselves away to visit the Egleton Centre where Tree Sparrow, Marsh Tit and Peregrine were some of the highlights.