We decided for this weeks Thursday outing to take our tea with us after changing the clocks. So Richards turned up at 13.00 hrs to collect me and we headed for our Little Owl area with the idea of visiting the Little Owls and then to head to Cossington Meadows to see if the Short-eared Owls were still with us for the later session of the day and after our tea.
We visited all our normal sites and the first site was being disturbed by some road works {a cattle grid was being replaced} so we carried on our way and eventually saw two birds at site No. 5 which is always good to see the pair. We then carried on and saw two birds at site No. 12, these birds were a considerable distance away on the far side of the field in what we believe to be the nest tree. After this we turned around and headed back on the same route to see if we had missed any birds. One site it appears we have lost, site No. 9, whilst looking and the nest hole we could see sicks had been carried in and placed in the entrance which more than likely means the Little Owls have been displaced. We then followed on through to site No. 2 where we saw one bird tucked in behind the tree so after this we had seen five Little Owls.
We then went straight through to Cossington Meadows and had an early tea before walking down the site. We eventually arrived at Swan Meadow for 16.30 hrs and met up with some of my normal cohorts and were told the birds had been around for about three quarters of an hour. Even though it was bright with the sunlight. it turned out to be dificult light to get decent images in, we were having to add in negative E V and still failing. This was the first time for several weeks that Richard had seen a Shortie so it was great to see them. All three of the birds were about and were spreading again over more of he reserve. This apparently happened the last time the birds were on site some five years ago, when they eventually left on the 16th of April so we could still have them a little longer, but who can tell. During the late afternoon Eagle Eye Richard spotted one of the resident Barn Owls on the far side of the meadow but we saw it land twice and then never saw it again. We took our last images about 19.00 hrs and then made our way home
COSSINGTON MEADOWS.
31st March 2016.
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Exmoor Pony. In one of my earlier post I stated that Dartmoor Ponies were on site, I have since found these to be Exmoor Ponies. |
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One of the ponies with a Magpie in training as a Jockey. |
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Pale Short-eared Owl from the lower gate. |
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Always something interesting on the ground. |
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One of the Darker birds, a silly distance away. |
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One of the Darker birds flew around and eventually landed on a post alongside the access track, so we stalked the bird as I did last week and finished up reasonably close but as you can see in both this and the image below I messed up by not putting in enough negative EV. |
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Such a shame the burn out on the wing, and my fault!! |
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The Darkest of the three birds having a swoop out towards the middle of the meadow. |
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Th mid coloured bird flying along the hedge line in the next field back towards the road. |
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Pale bird back in Swan Meadow. |
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Dark bird diving onto prey, unfortunately it missed. However I like the action in the image. |
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Pale bird out towards the middle of the meadow. |
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Pale Bird again. |
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As you can see we saw far more of the Pale Bird. This is appears to be the same on my other visits. |
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Pale Bird towards the far side of the meadow with two of the ponies.
LITTLE OWLS.
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Little Owl Site No. 19. I had a visit to my farmer friends on the 30th of March , saw no birds on the way in but saw this solitary bird on my return journey, unfortunately a shot into the sun. |
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Little Owl Site No. 5. We saw two birds at the site. |
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Lamb at Little Owl Site No. 8. This little beauty lay enjoying the sun in front of the tree where we occasionally see Little Owls. So by the time we had finished we had a nine owl day. Five Little Owls, Three Short-eared Owls and a Barn Owl, not bad at all. Sorry the post is late but we had our Bird Club meeting on Friday night so I got no works done on the blog. Thank you for your visit, I hope you have enjoyed the images as much as I have in the getting of them, please feel free to leave a comment. |
