Our Water Rail and Kingfisher Hide keeps coming up trumps, oh yes it does!

I had a couple of hours to spare this morning so grabbed my camera and high-tailed it down there just to see what was around.

The male Kingfisher was very busy and kept flashing past me, first one way empty, as above, and then back again with food for its mate further upstream.

I thought he'd never settle in front of me, but eventually he chose "our" pool and I managed a few shots ... first on one perch ...

... and then on another.

But it wasn't just the Kingfisher that was so beneficient. 

A Common Nightingale gave good views as it foraged in the open,

and of course the female Water Rail popped out a few times away from her brood. There must be three or four chicks in the nest opposite the hide as they were quite audible in the reeds just the other side of the water. I don't know when I'll ever become tired of taking shots of this bird that is usually so retiring but that with us gives such brilliant views.

Then a European Serin came down to drink from the safety of the Water Lillies,

and this was followed by an Iberian Magpie, a species often seen but seldom close by, so that was a bonus,

and a bonus too was a new species of Dragonfly for the hide, a Four-spotted Chaser, (Libellula quadrimaculata), not an uncommon species at all further north but not so common this far south and totally absent from the majority of Portugal.

Not a bad couple of hours really!