Today, I tried twitching a juvenile Little Crake at a small nature reserve I'd never been to, less than an hour from Brussels and a short walk from the nearest train station. I arrived, the other birders present said "There it is", and I was watching the crake before I could even set up my telescope! It stayed out in the open water long enough for me set up my scope and see it really well, before it disappeared back into the reedbeds, after which it only appeared intermittently and much further away for the rest of the morning. If only all twitches were so easy! Little Crake is a new bird for my European list since I'd only seen them in Israel before, and there were actually two juveniles present so they probably bred at the reserve. Strangely enough and in a repeat performance of the Black Hairstreak coincidence, I looked at my notes and discovered my first-ever Little Crake was EXACTLY 19 years ago, on 31 August 2000 at Kibbutz Kfar Ruppin! There were masses of Swallowtail butterflies flying around and lots of Cetti's Warblers singing, so I was really pleased to discover a nice, new location close to Brussels I'd probably never have visited had the Little Crake(s) not been found there.
