Within the Perimeter Fence

We finally got over to Watton to see the Cattle Egret that has been present in the area a number of weeks. The presence and whereabouts of the bird was rightly kept a secret at first as it was on a local farm but then news leaked out so publicity was put out.

The bird luckily became more prominent where it was visible from footpaths on local farmland and then for over the  last week in transferred to in the actual grounds of the Yorkshire Water Treatment Works which is at the entrance to Top Hill Lows fine reserve.

We would have gone last Sunday but it became a grim day weather wise. Anyway finally caught up today. When we first arrived it was visible from the front gate of the water plant so we set off and walk around the perimeter, the front gate approaches we view a white speck and off it flies. Luckily it flew to a duke near to where we came from so back again and a small group of birders/photographers had got it in a ditch at the back of the water works.

The top shot is much zoomed in and cropped, the second shows the sort of image I started with and the third that perimeter fence that the picture was taken through.

Cattle Egrets are members of the heron family, it is a stocky white bird adorned bu buff plumes in the breeding season. It nests in colonies usually near a body of water nesting on a platform of sticks in a tree or shrub. Unlike most herons it feeds mostly in grassland on small insects and vertebrates and follows cattle and other mammals that have been disturbed and thrown them up. It also removes ticks and flies from cattle.

After lunch the weather deteriorated and we did not see much more. On South Marsh West there were three pairs of Gadwell, a nice sight. A shot of the typical sighting today below in the gloom!