This was going to be the weekend where we and a whole group of others were going to get THE Great Crested Grebe courtship dance shot. It turned out that after two days of waiting, no-one actually got the shot, although it must be said there were some who came close. I've entitled this shot Will They, Won't They, because it is very typical of the behaviour they displayed. On Saturday there was not too much action, there was a stiff breeze and that made the water quite choppy. There were four pairs to choose from, but even those who managed to find some flatter water didn't oblige us. It would have been a distant shot had they done so. Frustrated by this lack of action, we moved off around the reserve and tried to hunt down some Bearded Tits. Some members of our group had already been successful the previous weekend and posted some stunning shots on Flickr. Again we were to be disappointed. They were there because we could hear them, but they were deep in the reeds and we never did see them.
Sunday was rather better from a wind strength point of view and that is when I got this shot. There were still four pairs of Grebes, but they were generally much closer to our position. I lost count of the number of times it looked like we should finally be lucky, but we never were. There was one occasion where one pair tried to exchange tokens of their love (a reed stalk and a small twig), but I guess neither were that impressed and eventually they parted.
On the face of it, a wasted weekend, but it was far from that. The weather was good, as was the company and it was quite relaxing just to watch the birds on their terms, with the feeling of expectation.
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