Owl’s About That - 1.1.24

Long-eared Owl (honestly!)

Tawny Owl

New Year’s Day again and today I joined Brendon Fagan on a trip to the Cambridgeshire fens. The journey up was fairly productive adding numerous birds to the fledgling year list. The first good bird of the day was near a place called Stretham where Brendon said egret over there. I looked over and saw it was a Great White Egret in a random river! Near Littleport I picked up a Barn Owl hunting over the fields. It eventually moved so that Brendon could see it. 

Our first stop was Southery where in a freezing wind we watched both Bewick’s and Whooper Swans out in the fields. Welney was our next stop where from the access track we had 4 Cattle Egret, Marsh Harrier and Ruff and at the feeders by the WWT car park we had 10+ Tree Sparrows. 

Glossy Ibis

We then headed to Nene Washes RSPB where after getting our eye in and with the help of another birder we could see a Long-eared Owl that was partially hidden in bushes. Tawny Owl was our next tartlet but we failed to see it so we carried on walking and added another dozen species to the list. But walking back to the car we came across a couple looking through their scope at the Tawny Owl. How we’d missed it I don’t know but it was probably because it was too obvious being sat in full view in its favoured hole not much above the water level. 

News then reached us of a Glossy Ibis not too far away so we headed off and once we’d worked out where  we were supposed to view from we found the young bird feeding in a boggy field and showing well. 

It was then back to Nene Washes where a rare duck had been re-found from a few days earlier. The walk was livened up when I picked up our 4th owl species of the day with a Short-eared Owl that flew into my scope view and perched up on a fence post out on the flood. 2 more were seen hunting along the bank and showed really well. Eventually the duck was pinned down but it was very distant so the views of my 4th ever American Wigeon weren’t exactly inspiring! I ended the day on 71 species so a good day out.