Saturday 30 December 2017

Second Helpings

Santon Downham 07:00 - 09:30 Cloud clearing to sunny intervals, mild with moderate SW wind.

Had a couple of hours spare this morning before I headed back to London so I paid another visit to Santon  Downham. A Barn Owl was hunting around the picnic place first thing and a Grey Wagtail was zipping up and down the river. I heard the unmistakable call of Crossbills and a group of about 17 flew over heading north, unfortunately they did not hang around and kept on their Northward journey, As numbers of Common Crossbills have been very low this year can only assume that they were the Parrot Crossbills that have been seen in the area recently. The Otter again put on another great show for the group of 10 or so people who had assembled on the bank.







Thursday 28 December 2017

Otters

Santon Downham -  07:00 - 0900 Sunny, cold -2 light winds

I arrived at Santon Downham just as the first glimmer of the new day was lighting up the eastern sky, the silhouette of 2 Woodcocks flew south and a party of 17 Whooper Swans flew in from the east and carried on westward, perhaps late migrants from the continent coming to spend the rest of the winter on the Fens.
I then walked along the Little Ouse river on the Norfolk/Suffolk border looking for Otters. It didn’t take me long to find one hunting around a partially fallen tree. It spent around thirty minutes working the area and bringing its catch onto the bank or a fallen branch to noisily munch away on its catch.
A search for the Parrot Crossbills was unsuccessful but 3 Stonechats were a small conciliation.





Tuesday 26 December 2017

Boxing Day Birding

Capel Fleet - Raptor Watch Point

07:00 - 09:30 Cold, bright with a stiff SW wind.

With having done all the cooking yesterday I was allowed a couple of hours of for good behaviour this morning

The car head lights picked out a Barn Owl flying across the road just before the viewing mound. From the mound a cracking male Hen Harrier flew through and the only other birds of prey seen were  5 Marsh Harriers, 3 Buzzards including a pale morph bird which maybe the bird responsible for the reports of a Rough-legged in the area recently and 1 Kestrel.
A Little Egret landed close to the mound and a couple of Corn Buntings landed briefly in the bushes, good numbers of Fieldfares, Redwings and the commoner Finches were feeding in the hedges and game strips



                                                                   Fieldfare


Buzzard