River Itchen (Winchester, Hampshire)

Farlington Marshes, Hampshire, England

Here are a few snaps we took yesterday on our trip to Farlington Marshes. This was the first time we had been this place - as we are relatively new to Hampshire - and we were quite amazed at the wealth of bird life we found. Of course we found the usual suspects such as, Redshank, Curlew, Plover and Geese in large quantities, but we also had the add bonus of seeing our first Short Eared Owl, which was hunting for it's dinner - so I've uploaded some video footage we managed to take of this exciting spectacle. I hope you enjoy what I've posted and if you ever get a chance to visit this place, although it's not in the most tranquil of locations being sandwiched between Portsmouth and the M27 motorway, you won't be disappointed.

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Brent Geese

....and again

Ringed Plovers

Low tide

Goldfinch

A selection of Brent Geese, Redshank and Curlew

Spinnaker Tower, Portsmouth

Low tide

A view over the flats 

Short Eared Owl!

This was the first time we had ever seen one of these beautiful birds either in captivity or in the wild. It took us a little while to narrow down what it could have been. First, we had to eliminate two of our most common species: the Barn Owl and the Tawny. When you see it initially it looks like a large Barn Owl because of the shape of its head, but of course Barn as well as Tawny owls are nocturnal so it couldn't have been one of them. My suspicion was a Short Eared Owl and on investigation both within our guide books and on the sightings board that suspicion was confirmed. Wow, how exciting! We managed to watch a very good hunting display for quite a while as it didn't seem to be bothered by us or the gathering band of locals with large camera lenses. We had come to Farlington to see primarily waders, sea birds and maybe a Marsh Harrier or two, so this was an added mega-bonus.

 A video of a short eared owl hunting for dinner

We managed to get some good footage of the bird hunting.

......and again

Diane and Elsa

Elsa looks bored. I don't think she shares our liking for birding or other boring Human activities. She probably wonders why we don't go around sniffing everything.

Never mind Elsa don't worry we'll feed you soon

Oystercatchers (mid shot)

Brent Geese (rear) and a Curlew (centre)

Now I've considered this one for a while and I've come to the conclusion it's a Stonechat

A glorious sunset over the marshes

 It was quite warm today which is very unusual (bizarre?) for November. Not saying just observing.

An Egret doing it's thing