If you go down to the reeds today you are sure for an interesting sight.
The chill of evening and a cobalt blue sky melts away the warmth of what has proven to be a fabulous first day of this month’s optics special weekend, into the half light of a pastel shaded dusk. A small crowd of people hushed by the sound of snipe, water rail and the soft whistling of teal, were leaning their ears to the night air along the causeway.
Bats flew over the heads of this expectant audience, waiting for a rather illusive and rare sound from a secretive bird, performing an equally rather secretive spectacle. Standing in near darkness and scrutinising every churp, whistle, splash and creak from the moving of Leighton moss’s wildlife in wait of a bitterns “gull calling” flight call, offers a unique ambience to the little heard sound of the night air of reedbeds in spring all over the UK where bitterns breed.
Snipe by Andy Hay (rspb-images.com)
Seeing such a large bird as a bitterns looping flight patterns over potential territory is a bizarre yet fascinating sight, with its call sounding like a gull giving rise to the description of bitterns gull calling. And this weekend, a bittern silhouetted under a clear white star studded sky, appearing from out of nowhere and giving onlookers a memorable encounter with a creature so closely connected with these places. It was watched and admired with very good views as it circled the reeds, emanating its strange gull like calls, before losing height and dropping back to an earth of water and reed.
A further bittern was heard at the far end of the causeway not long after the first indicating a bare minimum of two remain on the reserve.
Other wildlife from the last few days include 19 whooper swans stopping off here in front of Lilian’s hide for the night on Sunday before leaving the next day to continue their migration back to Iceland. Great views of the pochards and tufted ducks from the skytower. Little grebes are becoming increasingly vocal around the reserve from the skytower and causeway hides particularly. Gadwalls and goldeneyes remain often sighted from lower hide and causeway hide together with 100’s of teals that can be viewed from most of the hides.
Tuesday morning proved to be the start of a superb day on the reserve with good weather bringing the first singing willow warblers towards lower hide. Two garganeys that arrived on Monday have caused a stir of excitement with visitors. Being Britons only summer migratory breeding duck and breeding in low numbers at scattered locations they are certainly worth taking the time to spot from lower hide.
Garganey by Martin Kuchczynski
Tuesdays crown for most exciting migrant goes to the beautiful male hen harrier seen cruising over the reeds against a wonderful backdrop of the rising sun from lower hide early in the morning.
Four great white egrets and a cattle egret remain present with around 60 little egrets roosting in the trees beyond the causeway making their way through a cloud of 100’s of sand martins. Our resident otters are coming back on the scene with sightings from causeway hide throughout the day becoming more frequent. Our marsh harriers are busy getting to know each other.
The great crested grebes are still displaying with at least two pairs on the reserve.
Down at the salt marsh hides, good numbers of redshanks, 24 avocets, nearly 900 black-tailed godwits and lots of shelducks can regularly be seen using the pools.
Avocets by Richard Cousens
The dawn chorus around the reserve is getting better by the day now with a big thanks to Andy Chapman for leading another great Bird Song for Beginners event last Sunday. The long list of songsters included redwings which offered a curve ball to the more expected sounds of green woodpeckers, song thrush, Cetti’s warblers, water rails, green finches, treecreepers, nuthatches and coal tits the group encountered that morning. Leighton Moss is certainly as good a place as any for those testing or refreshing their ear for bird song.
Why not visit for the challenge of not coming for what you can see, but coming for what you can hear!