Rutland Water and Windmill Tea Shop 6th May 2022

We started our holiday with a stopover afternoon at Rutland Water. An early start meant that we had a few hours at Rutland Water where we managed to get excellent views of the two Ospreys both on and off the nest, the fame feeding on a fish the male had caught earlier. But the best bird of the day was seen when we stopped at the Windmill Tea Shop at Wymondham.

We were sitting outside on the grassy area when we looked up and saw a Buzzard interacting with another raptor. I took it to be a Red Kite but I wasn’t sure. I had left my bins in the car so went back to the car to get it. As I got to the car, the mystery bird started circling around over the car park a mere 30 feet or so above my head. My immediate thought was that it wasn’t a Red Kite but a Black Kite. The appearance of the bird was almost completely black apart from a lighte patch on the wings. It’s tail had a very shallow fork. I have seen lots of Red Kites at this height before and this looked nothing like it. Unfortunately there were no other birders around to verify this identification and a quick look at Bird Guides only showed Black Kites down in Sussex not this far north. I mentioned it when we got to another reserve but all I got was that it must have been a Red Kite looking black against the sky. However this explanation is really only valid when the bird is at a fair distance against a sky. This bird was so low that I was hardly looking into the light and it was at least partly backgrounded by trees.

I suppose that I should have just written it off as ambiguous but I was so convinced that this was a species of Kite I had not seen before that I disagreed with the rather lazy opinion that all Kites look black against a bright sky. I concluded that I had good reason to positively ID the bird but it flew off before I could get a camera out to take a picture.

Anyway, we drove on to the Anglian Water Bird Watching Centre at Egleton, Rutland and did the usual walk there taking in all the hides on the northern half of the reserve. It has to be said that it wasn’t a touch on when we were last there when the place was teeming with great birds but that was a little earlier than this trip by a couple of weeks which is significant in terms of when birds are tyring to find territory and mates. We did here our first Cuckoo of the year but, as was the case for all of our holiday, it was heard but not seen. We also got our first Red Kite of the year (see above!) and Red Legged Partridge and Sand Martin were also year ticks. Other than that though the only other year tick was over at the Lyndon Visitor Centre where we made a beeline for the usual hide where we see the Ospreys. This year the pair of birds had successfully bred again and we had great views of the birds both on and off the nest with the female on a nearby tree slowly finishing off a fish that her partner had caught earlier. Very good views of the Ospreys in very good light made up for the otherwise not massively impressive number of new species for the year we had hoped for. On the other hand, any visit to Rutland is a good visit.

That night we stayed over at the King’s Arms in the village of Wing whcih worked out well for us and was on the right side of the water for the next leg of our trip to Norfolk.

Bird Sightings : Windmill Tea Shop at Wymondham 6th May 2022

Bird Sightings : Rutland Water 6th May 2022