I was at Slimbridge WWT last weekend and the Pintails were swimming around right in front of the first hide providing some rare, close-up photographic opportunities of these usually shy ducks. There were around 60 Bewick's Swans making a lot of noise, and a hunting Marsh Harrier put the assembled waders, including at least 200 Black-tailed Godwit and possibly double that amount of Dunlin together with a Little Stint, into the air where they wheeled around in Starling-like formations. A very distant Barn Owl made a brief appearance and a Water Rail stood out in the open underneath one of the feeders. The biggest impression of the day, however, was made by the gorgeous Orange-headed Thrush in the tropical house, which we passed through in order to warm up a little. A couple of days later, I took the train from London to Nottingham and counted seven different Red Kites, proving that the English reintroduction scheme has been a great success. In comparison, I saw just one Buzzard during the entire journey. Lastly, I made a brief visit to Rutland Water, where I recorded 56 different species in just a couple of hours between snow showers. The biggest surprise was a Cetti's Warbler spluttering its song from within a reedbed but there were also lots of Goldeneye, both egrets, a Green Woodpecker and my first Mistle Thrushes of the year.
Back in Brussels, I stood at a Starling roost yesterday for half an hour and counted the birds arriving, which was no mean feat. The groups, several of them containing well over 100 individuals, were coming in very fast and disappearing into the bushes before I could count them properly but I still managed a conservative total of 2040!
