|
Post by Tringa on Jul 12, 2015 9:24:37 GMT
Some superb photos, as always, Bryan. Great to hear the updates too.
Not surprised by poor breeding in some areas. I'm in NW Scotland now and although, over the last week+, we have had some hot days, it is more like March than July just now and locals have said the spring and early summer weather was very poor here.
Dave
|
|
|
Post by aeshna5 on Jul 12, 2015 13:46:07 GMT
Agree great to hear of your updates. Fine work indeed!
|
|
|
Post by kentyeti on Jul 16, 2015 20:05:01 GMT
Thanks guys.
Just starting to pick up a trickle of reports of Shorties in Britain after a few months when there were very few sightings reported as expected. All in the NE of England at present.
Could be the very start of Scottish Owls starting to move South. Mid July is a tad early still: it looked to me like they started to disperse from Langholm last year late in July. A process that went on well into the Autumn.
Perhaps more likely is that Juveniles that bred locally are now hunting fully for themselves and having to use some daylight hours as well as the night to catch all they need as they develop their skills. So they are now being seen by birders who keep somewhat more respectable hours than a fanatical Short-eared Owl watcher like myself. LOL!
I suspect way too early for any coming in from Scandinavia yet. But watch this space as it was supposed to be the peak of the vole cycle over there this year. Fingers crossed for our Autumn and Winter months.
Cheers,
Bryan
|
|
|
Post by aeshna5 on Jul 17, 2015 5:59:26 GMT
It would be good to see some locally again this winter. Very few in the London area last winter compared with a good one preceding it.
|
|
|
Post by ChrisJB on Jul 19, 2015 22:35:47 GMT
Last night I saw 1 - 2 on a local moor (South Pennines) and upon going back this evening, saw at least four, two of which were certainly adults. The other two were too distant to tell.
|
|
|
Post by kentyeti on Jul 25, 2015 19:47:58 GMT
Thanks Chris, nice to know they are still around up there. Although they are on the move now. One reported in Notts recently and today one in East Tilbury, Essex. I wonder where that one came from! I would have thought a bit early to have come from Scandinavia, but they can be very unpredictable Owls.
I'm still monitoring the breeding territories I watched earlier this year in the North. Not a lot left to see but I need to get my field notes as complete as I can. And for the coming Autumn and Winter I'd like to do some observation work in the NE and NW of England, the Midlands and anywhere in Wales. So any reports from those locations as they, hopefully, start getting down to the lower areas including the coastal marshlands etc would help a lot.
Cheers,
Bryan
|
|
|
Post by dogghound on Jul 27, 2015 22:40:56 GMT
Started to pick ones and twos up again. Had one the other evening moving south over the sea fairly high up. Was still growing it's tail so presumably a juvenile bird, on post breeding dispersion.
|
|
|
Post by kentyeti on Jul 28, 2015 9:20:32 GMT
Don't know about you Dan and the others here but I'd love to know where they come from. I'd like to help fund the BTO project(s) hoping to put sat tags on some which would be of great interest to me. But the enormous cost of my book has to come first. I think! LOL!
I guess that if the one you mention was coming in from the sea high up it could be a Scandinavian Owl. Contact with Heimo Mikkola in Finland last year got me the information that 2015 should be the vole cycle peak again, as in 2011. Fingers crossed!
I know some are still on their breeding grounds in the very North of England and South Scotland. But most will no doubt be heading South soon.
|
|
|
Post by dogghound on Jul 28, 2015 11:49:09 GMT
It was travelling along the coast rather than coming directly in so difficult to say the most likely destination. Could be a british bird "coasting". There have been several which have been on and off along the coast all summer but the height of this one and direct flight seemed more like a migrating individual. Yes satelite tagging would be interesting for a species like this which is highly migratory and follows food with a relatively irregular fashion.
|
|
|
Post by ChrisJB on Jul 29, 2015 20:41:31 GMT
Thanks Chris, nice to know they are still around up there. Although they are on the move now. One reported in Notts recently and today one in East Tilbury, Essex. I wonder where that one came from! I would have thought a bit early to have come from Scandinavia, but they can be very unpredictable Owls. I'm still monitoring the breeding territories I watched earlier this year in the North. Not a lot left to see but I need to get my field notes as complete as I can. And for the coming Autumn and Winter I'd like to do some observation work in the NE and NW of England, the Midlands and anywhere in Wales. So any reports from those locations as they, hopefully, start getting down to the lower areas including the coastal marshlands etc would help a lot. Cheers, Bryan By all accounts Bryan, it has been a good year for them in the South Pennines as a whole. Much better than the last few years anyway, when they have been thin on the ground indeed.
Regards, Chris
|
|
|
Post by kentyeti on Aug 11, 2015 20:35:13 GMT
Just back from another trip to Langholm, Scotland and the North Pennines. 17th trip up there from Kent since April last year and I'm back very, very tired. Not used to working nights, apart from one Shortie in the Pennines that comes out before dark, the others have all gone fully nocturnal: their default setting.
Surprised to find 5 still at Langholm, that is probably more than half of those from the two pairs known to have bred there this season. One pair on my observation stretch and another pair where I suspect 2 Juveniles have now got themselves onto where I look for Shorties. A least on one night! Watched one of those on the road from very close indeed at 01.00 ripping the guts out of a vole before it was small enough to swallow in one piece. A very gory business, glad I'd already eaten my "meal" for the night: a Co-Op pasta salad. Very nice too.
Nice to see some Barn Owls up there, plus the usual Tawnys where I know they live. And had about a minute watching a Long-eared Owl one night. Always love seeing them.
Even got some Barn Owl in sunshine photos! Perched very close. Out early one evening after night time weather disruption.
Had a play with a thermal imaging viewer one night. One of the gamekeeping team out on fox patrol stopped for a chat and was showing me the stuff he used at night. Quite impressed.
Need some rest and then I'll sort my photos an post a couple here.
Cheers,
Bryan
|
|
|
Post by kentyeti on Aug 12, 2015 20:11:38 GMT
|
|
|
Post by kentyeti on Aug 12, 2015 20:12:53 GMT
|
|
|
Post by kentyeti on Aug 25, 2015 8:38:42 GMT
An interesting late summer.
I have a standard system of trawling the Internet for Shortie reports. I am building up a database of sightings to help with my book.
7 reports in the whole of August last year.
35 reports so far in August this year.
Not outright proof of anything, but as I said up front, interesting.
They are being seen in Kent and Sussex now. After the good winter for them 2014/15 in the SE of England I suspect some have been here all summer but totally nocturnal: I've been in the North too much to do any night work down here. But 4 at Sandwich Bay in Kent, assuming an accurate report, indicates a small group on the move from/to somewhere. Or maybe here as stayers now!
Incidentally I still have no firm view on what brings some of them out into partial daylight hunting in autumn and winter. It's certainly not just prey activity: in some locations I have studied in depth I doubt it is even that. I am having to put aside a lot of what has been said by all but those who have studied them as extensively as myself, (3,700 hours of field work now), as more and more my book is being based on my field work plus reference etc to the work of such as Calladine and Mikkola. Cheers,
Bryan
|
|
|
Post by aeshna5 on Aug 25, 2015 14:50:23 GMT
First London sighting of the autumn a few days ago.
|
|