Having missed out on seeing the Night Heron on Sunday we decided we should give it another go and so last night we went back to Earlswood Lakes.
We arrived about 6.30pm and headed off around the lakes scanning the trees and the undergrowth. It was a fantastic evening, and the lakes looked lovely with the blue skies above and the sun reflecting upon the water. The ducks were present (although we didn't see the Mandarin Duck that is there) as were the terns, gulls, geese, grebes and swans. Swifts and swallows skimmed across the water and, as the sun went down, the fish started to jump.
As the sun got lower the insects were swarming over the water and all around us. We had been there about 15 minutes (8.15pm) when the birders started to watch the silhouette of a bird approaching from the lake we had just come from. At first I mistook it for a crow but as it got closer I realised that this was what we had been looking for. The bird was making it's nightly journey over the lakes to the canal. We watched it pass and head beyond the trees behind us before rising up and turning a couple of times and then disappearing. The whole thing lasted about a minute.
We hung around until just gone 9pm. The bird watchers we had first spoken with had mainly disappeared but they were replaced by about a dozen others who seemed a bit miffed to be told they had missed it.
Whether it flew back or not I don't know. It was getting cold and we had achieved our goal so we called it a day and headed to the pub. Just before we left I heard one of the birders say that that was the first Night Heron he had seen in over 25years of bird spotting.
Usually found in Southern Europe, Asia, Africa & The Americas, the Night Heron is a rare visitor to this country. Usually there are about 10 recorded visits a year. With one just a couple of miles down the road I'm really chuffed I was able to see it
PS All the pictures are mine except the one of the bird itself. That was taken by a Mr Dave Hutton. I would've loved to have seen it that clearly!
