A Ruff Morning at Farmoor 4th September 2022

Two days ago I walked along the causeway at Farmoor in the middle of the afternoon with frankly nothing better to do than waste a bit of time. I was freewheeling in mind and body, not really birding, without a camera slung round my neck, just bins, luxuriating in the fact I was for once not weighed down by the assemblage of heavy and expensive optical and photographic equipment that one seems to need to go birding these days. I felt almost light headed with the lack of encumbrance, reprising how it used to be in the old days 

Of course I should have known better as approaching the far end of the causeway I could see two toggers pointing their lenses at a medium sized wader wandering the concrete edge of the reservoir. I knew what it was from the way it walked busily and elegantly along the water's edge. It was a Ruff. A juvenile male Ruff.

These past months of drought and sunshine have caused the water levels of the reservoir to fall dramatically  and in the process have exposed a narrow band of muddy edge, which looks ideal for hungry and tired waders to stop on and feed.Well that's the theory but so far it has not really happened.Where are all the Curlew Sandpipers and Little Stints that should be flocking here?

A Ruff is a good bird to see at Farmoor. Usually only one or two pitch up on autumn migration although they are sociable birds and can migrate in huge flocks, hundreds if not thousands strong. Invariably the birds that stop off at Farmoor are juvenile birds, making their first migratory journey from a probable birthplace in Scandinavia, moving southwards as far as tropical Africa although some will remain in Europe and small numbers can even be found in southern Britain in winter

I went back to the car to get my camera but when I returned the Ruff had gone. I walked the entire three mile circumference of the reservoir looking for it but it had gone.I had no one else to blame but myself.

The next day, Saturday I had to drive to the outskirts of London for an all day conference and forgot all about the Ruff. It was gone.No use fretting about it. Move on. There is always tomorrow.

Sunday arrived and after yesterday's long car journey I decided on an early visit to the reservoir to get yesterday's driving out of my bones. A strong but mild wind was blowing from the south but the day was grey with cloud and there looked to be little chance of sunshine.

I was not expecting to see much but there is always that frisson of expectation as you begin to walk the causeway at Farmoor. I tell myself anything can turn up but usually my hopes are frustrated. In the case of Farmoor, as with any other location it's a matter of constantly visiting and by the law of averages you will eventually encounter something reasonably exciting but this morning did not look to be the one.

A third of the way up the causeway a flock of waders took off from the concrete at the water's edge and flew out over the reservoir. It was a flock of seven Turnstones and two Ruff. The Ruff returned to the water's edge but the Turnstones kept going, rising ever higher in the sky and that was the last I or anyone else saw of them.

A good start but the two Ruff quickly flew off again. With mixed emotions I looked to the other side of the causeway and there was another Ruff wandering along by the water! Walking further I found another three all doing much the same thing but independently, each bird spaced well apart along the causeway. But then came two together, keeping close company, one markedly smaller than the other.

A Ruff and Reeve

A Ruff and a Reeve. In the end, by walking the entire length of the causeway I found no less than eight Ruff, six males and two females, the latter noticeably smaller than the males and confusingly called a Reeve.

This was easily the largest number of Ruff I have personally seen at the reservoir.

They are a joy to observe. After a diet of Sanderlings, Dunlins, Ringed Plovers and Turnstones this spring and autumn, all four species smaller and with comparatively short legs and dumpy bodies, a juvenile Ruff is a creature of elegance personified. It's the legs that do it for me. Long in the tibia and with likewise long toes they cannot but appear graceful and any movement on the bird's part is always accomplished with a smooth elegance.  In body too they are supremely neat. Their orangy buff head and breast with not a feather out of place are complemented by neatly scalloped upperparts, again the fresh feathers immaculate in their symmetry and overall pattern.

It is impossible for them to perform any action in what could be described as an ungainly manner such is the pleasing amalgam of neat plumage and long leggedness that is a Ruff.

Add to this they are invariably and ridiculously confiding, and if you had a mind to you could almost walk up to them. I never felt for one moment they would fly from me no matter how close I was and indeed they were more spooked by the large gulls and crows that occasionally flew over them, causing them to fly out over the water in a languid flight, to land further along the water's edge and resume their endless feeding.

By nine am it was all over and only one Ruff remained, tripping daintily amongst the foam flecked stones on a wind exposed shore.