The constant rain showers had given up for an hour and we decided to head for Stover Park. As we exited the car park, a blackbird swooped low over the needle littered undergrowth and came to rest by a drainage ditch. Sticking it’s beak deep in the soil, dirt flew from the hole it had made but, even with it’s efforts, flapped back into the brambles with an empty beak.
A great, glossy black crow tore it’s way through the towering conifer trees, then settled down in a dwarfed birch. Burying its enormous beak under it’s wing, it began to preen its shimmering feathers. A robin warbled from in the midst of a bush.
The quacks and honks of ducks and swans gradually grew louder and more distracting as we neared the lake. A mandarin duck plodded into the water and 2 mallards sat in the grass near the clump of ash trees. 2 gleaming white mute swans ploughed their way across the water with 8 cygnets, unchallenged as the male charged at any bird who was unfortunate enough to get caught near the cygnets.
We continued up to the wooden bridge, ticking off more ducks on the way. Many squirrels scampered beneath the trees, and there was a coot on the nest on the other side of the channel. Nuthatches and tits flitted from tree to tree and a movement in the reeds struck me as a moorhen. I started clicking my camera shutter on the coot’s nest and then the moorhen began to swim. But I couldn’t see a moorhen. If it wasn’t disturbing the water, I wouldn’t have noticed. It kept so low down that I could barely see it. Then, as I zoomed in, a brown snout led onto a beady black eye. A brown rat was paddling under the bridge!
Ploughing on towards the feeding station, we’re joined by tits galore. Underneath the feeders, there were a couple of pheasants and chaffinches. A stock dove was curled up on a stout branch, and blue and coal tits were flitting from the trees to feeders.
Overall, an evening out that was worth it.
The Bovey Birder 