The Water Rails of Slimbridge

I fancied a day out birding somewhere between Christmas and the new year and with nothing on my twitching radar I decided to try and photograph Water Rails at Slimbridge.

The Water Rail, Rallus aquaticus, is, surprise surprise, a member of the rail family, a worldwide genus mainly associated with wetlands but they also occupying many other terrestrial low lying habitats. In the UK the Water Rail is a common but highly secretive bird, particularly in the breeding season when it is more often heard than seen. It prefers to sulk deep in the wetland undergrowth rather than come out into the open. It has a very distinctive call often said to resemble a squealing pig. It has some similarities to its common Moorhen cousin but is smaller and slimmer. It is an attractive and charismatic bird with chestnut-brown and black upperparts, a grey face and underparts, black-and-white barred flanks, and a long red bill. To my eyes at least, its facial expression makes it look rather angry and bad tempered.

At some locations, Slimbridge being one, in the winter hungry Water Rails will nervously come out into the open to feed on the leftovers under bird feeders. This tends to be a game of patience as it can be several hours between excursions from the cover to under the bird feeder. I spent about 4 hours in the Willow hide yesterday at Slimbridge and was rewarded with 4 or 5 feeding visits. These were rudely interrupted on two occasions by a Sparrow Hawk looking for easy pickings around the bird feeder after which the Water Rail wisely decided to stay under cover for an hour or so.

It was comparatively undisturbed by many, often quite noisy people, coming in and out of the hide but would occasional quickly scutter back into the undergrowth for no apparent reason but I it’s sense of imminent danger was certainly better than mine.

I manged to rattle off a memory card full of images which is so easy to do with the fast bursts rate of the R5. Here are my favourite ones.

Footnote – my blogs are posted with sometimes rather imaginative spelling and grammar due to my extreme dyslexia!

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