Feb 26th Strumpshaw Fen

It has been an eventful start to the morning today. I had to get a bus instead of a train as all the early trains were cancelled due to a tragic incident at the station. You can read all about it here https://www.edp24.co.uk/news/person-dies-at-norwich-railway-station-1-6531959

Percy the Pheasant

When I arrived at Strumpshaw, Percy was there to greet me. I have to be honest to say this, dear readers, I don't like Percy much anymore. He's been more persistent than usual. Recently, I have been avoiding him on purpose by cutting through the fenced off yard where the office is. Today, though, I decided to risk it and allow him to follow me through the woods. Getting my stuff out of my bag at the blind beside the Reception Hide, he leapt up on the fencing behind the blind, sitting there watching me impatiently. Once I was ready, I made my way through the woods. This was when he became a bit aggressive with a few mock charges at me. To him, I was not just a provider of food, I was now treated as a rival male. Thankfully, he wasn't around when I returned to do the feeders, but I did find him fighting another male pheasant. The video below just demonstrates the what these birds tend to do at this time of year as the hormones for breeding kick in.

Barn Owl

It was a bit too cold to hang around inside Fen Hide for too long this morning, not that there were much to see anyway. So, instead of staying any longer and risk freezing to death, I went for a walk towards the pump house via the river trail. I was almost at the pump house, when I noticed movement on the opposite side of the meadows. A barn owl was on the hunt. It was distant at first, but then it started flying towards my direction. And then, to my amazement, it perched on a bit of fencing a short distance from where I was standing! It perched there just long enough for me to capture my best ever shots of a barn owl I have ever taken. What an encounter! After a short while, it caught sight of something in the grass nearby and plunged down to catch it. It was down there longer than expected, so I think it caught whatever it was successfully.

Bullfinch

Walking on, I discovered a couple of mixed flocks of goldfinches and siskins feeding on the alder cones in the woods. Further still, the shy 'pew' calls of bullfinches alerted me to them feeding on a tree covered in blossom. After my walk, I went to flip the opening sign from closed to open, but before I could even do that, I was distracted by a red kite flying over the office area. And, as my shift at the Reception Hide was nearing an end, an otter appeared splashing around the broad busy hunting! That's three weeks in a row for seeing an otter now!

Feb 19th Strumpshaw Fen

Greylag

It is half term this week for schools across the UK, meaning that there's a lot of children off school. Where better place to take them this week than at Strumpshaw. An activity trail is set up throughout the woodland trail for the little ones to learn about birds, while also building things and having fun. My role? Well, today I was told to help teach them find some of the birds on their tick sheet, which included mostly common garden birds plus a couple slightly tricky woodland birds like treecreepers and bullfinches. I wasn't able to locate these latter two for the families, but if I was the one doing the sheet, I actually saw almost all of them on my own, missing only the treecreeper and only hearing the bullfinch earlier on during my morning walk.

Whilst walking around the woods, trying to locate that elusive treecreeper, I discovered this beauty. I believe it is a chaffinch nest. It is a wonderfully crafted bowl of moss, sticks and mud. I don't think I've ever discovered one before, not that I'm an expert on finding bird nests any way.

Chaffinch nest

Away from helping the families find their birds, I was in my usual position in the Reception Hide spotting wildlife for the sightings board. The big highlights were a peregrine making a brief fly over and an otter swimming around the far side of the broad for several minutes. Neither were photogenic, so no photos of the otter this time around, unlike my lucky encounter last week. Also seen today were; greylags, mallards, gadwall, shelducks, buzzards, marsh harriers and Percy the pheasant, who soon vanished completely after I did a detour to avoid him from chasing me (he didn't even showed up while I was filling up the feeders!).

Feb 12 Strumpshaw Fen

Brrr! A chilly and blustery morning at Strumpshaw today. Thankfully, the winds were nowhere near as bad as the storm that happened on Sunday. It was the cold that really made my morning a tad unbearable than the wind, it was absolutely freezing! There was only a few frosty patches and frozen puddles, though. The landscape wasn't a winter wonderland just yet. However, the landscape may not have changed much, but there was one thing that was different than usual. Percy was missing! My persistent pheasant that follows me around was nowhere to be found. He was not waiting for me at the feeders or ambushed me through the woodland trail. Where did he go?

Otter

I walked down to Fen Hide pheasant-free. I opened up the wooden window flaps. At first, I thought the scene in front of me was empty. But then, some splashing caught my eye and... OTTER!! For a couple of minutes, it splashed and dived around the pool as it busily homed in on its fishy prey. Eventually, it caught one, a rudd, I believe, and it took its freshly caught meal to the bank on the far shore and began to feast on it. I don't often get privileged views of otters on land like this, so it was an exciting moment. I sat and watched in silence as the otter munched away at the fish, providing me plenty of opportunity to get some decent photos of it. Once it had its fill, it swam towards Reception Hide and was gone...

That is until I returned to Reception Hide that is. Because it was now here, swimming around the broad like a fur-coated dolphin continuing its quest to fill its belly. For quite sometime, it was busy hunting before it swam down the far left channel. A couple of hours later, it returned a second time. This time, a marsh harrier with orange wing tags was swooping at it in a territorial dispute. But this was just a short second visit as it was soon making its exit down the far right channel. Other than the otter, it was pretty quiet with very little else to see. I expect the wind was forcing most of the other wildlife to take shelter. A sensible decision.

Feb 5th Strumpshaw Fen & Feb 8th Hickling Broad

Feb 5th  Strumpshaw Fen

Bearded Tit

It was a very pleasant Wednesday morning. There was a feeling that spring was on its way. Snowdrops cover one tiny section of the woodland trail white with their drooping flowers. Woodpeckers were drumming, treecreepers were singing their trill of a song as they spiral around tree trunks, while blossom were forming on some of the shrubs. During my morning walk, I spooked a sparrowhawk taking a drink at a flooded pool, taking flight before I even realised it was even there and I encountered some reed bunting feeding on the ground at the end of the Sandy Wall path. Then on the way back from a silent Fen Hide, I came across a bearded tit pinging from the edge of a reedbed while a Chinese water deer grazed from the stubble of an opened up area nearby. Other than that, it was marsh harriers, buzzards and mallards and gadwall from Reception Hide. Oh, and Percy the pheasant was definitely alive after last week's pheasant shoot and very much hungry as usual.

Feb 8th  Hickling Broad

Mum and I went for a morning visit to Hickling Broad today in the hope of finding another bird I've surprisingly never photographed before. Scaup are very scarce winter visiting diving ducks that can be best described as a combination of a pochard and a tufted duck. The male looks like a pochard but with a green head, while the female looks like a female tufted duck without the tuft and a broader white patch at the base of the bill. I haven't seen a scaup in a while and I've never gotten a decent photo of one. The last photo I got of one was while it was asleep a few years ago, which is not worth keeping.

I've been hearing on and off reported sightings throughout the last couple of weeks of a pair of scaup being at Hickling. This happens to be my second visit in search of them. Sadly though, just as with that previous visit, I left disappointed. This is a duck that prefers open water, but after scanning every tufted duck and pochard out on the broad, I just couldn't pick a scaup out from amongst any of them. However, I did hear plenty of bearded tit action as well as some very distant bugling of cranes and saw a snipe. Better consolation than anything, I guess.

Feb 1st Ipswich

Tawny owls are the commonest owl species in the UK. They are also the one species that happen to live in towns and cities with us. The only problem is, they are nocturnal. By night, they are actively hunting and busy claiming their territories with their iconic hooting calls. By day, however, they are almost impossible to locate unless you happen to know a roost site or stumble upon one being mobbed by defensive blackbirds and other birds. I have encountered these owls in the dark on several occasions, but have never seen one in the day before. With my year of finding bird species I've never gotten a decent photo of underway, tawny owls are high up the list.

I've asked around to see if anyone knows of a roost site in Norfolk, but with very little success. There was the site in North Elmham, but I ended up empty handed. No one else came up with another site. Well, actually, there was one. However, it wasn't in Norfolk. It was in Suffolk, and even worse, it was in Ipswich. As a Norwich City fan, I had no intention of travelling into enemy territory, around the streets and parks of our arch rivals. But I've come to the point where I'm out of any other options.

Tawny Owl

So, if I wanted to see and photograph a tawny owl, I had to take a train out to Ipswich to a park where one had been seen sitting out in the open on the same oak tree since 2007. It did disappear between 2017-2018, but it appears to be back since November. This individual has become a bit of a local celebrity. She was given the name 'Mabel' and erected a wooden owl sculpture with her name engraved on it beside her tree. However, most tawny owls only live for around 5 years, with a few remarkable individuals reaching the age of 10, so for this owl to be Mabel would be beyond remarkable. This could well be a different owl, perhaps one of Mabel's offspring. If I wanted to see a tawny in broad daylight, then seeing 'Mabel II' was a very good opportunity that I couldn't pass down.

As I stated earlier, as a Norwich fan, I've detested the idea of coming to Ipswich, so this was my first (and only) visit. I used my new phone to navigate the streets of the town, but once I arrived to Christchurch Park where the owl lives, I had no idea where about this tree was. This park had plenty of paths and trees, I didn't know where to look first. I ended up wandering around in the hope of stumbling upon the tree by chance. But, I came across a duck pond with several mandarin ducks and a single male hooded merganser on it instead. It was here a kind elderly woman came up to me, initially asking about the merganser (she apparently hadn't seen it on this pond before) at first, only to discuss about the owl and its whereabouts. With her help, I made my way to the owl tree, which was pretty obvious with the sculpture being there. It was a matter of seconds when I spotted the owl itself.


Mandarin Duck

Hooded Merganser

Mable II (Again)

The owl sat within a hollow at the very top of the tallest branch like a very fluffy Christmas tree angel, peering back down at me with a half asleep expression. It was enough to make anyone go weak at the knees saying 'Awww! So cute!" There was some kind of park run going on when I was at the park with hundreds of people, young and old, taking part. They ran in what seemed to be an endless stream of rushing people, but every now and then, some of them stopped to take a look at Mabel II. She is that popular and loved that they couldn't help themselves but to say hello to the owl in a tree.



After my time with Mable II, I went to the nearby cemetery where I was told ring-necked parakeets have been hanging out. I didn't see any though, just a sparrowhawk circling above. With that, I decided to make it back to the train. By the time I was crossing the bridge that led to the railway station, Ipswich fans were making their way to Portman Road in the opposite direction. Good job I wasn't wearing my Norwich shirt this morning. And whilst waiting on a bench on the platform for my train to arrive, another train stopped behind me. Its doors open and as soon as it did, a raucous chanting chorus of "'Boro!" made me jump out of my skin. The opposing team's fans had arrived and it was Peterborough United. I was extremely happy when I heard news that Peterborough thrashed Ipswich 4-1!