Ross's Gull and Whiskered Tern

I had a fantastic evening at Bowling Green Marsh; I popped over to see the Ross's and was rewarded for the effort as 6 Sandwich Tern and a Whiskered Tern dropped in!
I have a LOT of pics of the aforementioned species to post soon...

Ross's Gull

Ross's Gull

Sandwich Tern

Whiskered Tern

Whiskered Tern

Barn Owl and Bunny

...and not with the latter being prey! A couple more Barn Owl pics from this evening; again they are not great as I haven't been able to photograph it much before 20:30 yet. Hopefully my persistence will change this soon... The bunny pic is just for fun:

'I think this means that I am hidden...'

Yet more owl pics!!

Barn Owl

Barn Owl

Tawny Owlet

Tawny Owl

Tawny Owl close-up

Tawny Owl closer-up!

Owl photos, both Barn & Tawny

An evening visit to Black Hole Marsh proved a worthwhile venture; the remaining Tawny Owl parent and chick were showing albeit in difficult positioning for photography. I did manage to get a couple of clear shots just after 21:00 (it was getting dark meaning I had to use ISO 6400 on the camera!!). A Barn Owl also put on a pleasing performance and gave the impression that it was taking prey to and fro to feed to other birds. This is indicative that it's a bird from a breeding pair; it'd be good if this is the case as there's been little evidence of Barn Owls pairing up here so far this year.
Here's some of the Owl pics from this evening along with a pic of a Little Ringed Plover (at Black Hole Marsh all afternoon & evening). Please forgive the poor image quality of the owl pics; the light was not ideal due to the hours when such species are most active!

Tawny Owl

Lots to go up on here soon, when workload permits! I had some lovely views of an adult Tawny Owl this afternoon; here's one of the shots:

Superb Spring breeders in Colyton

Apologies for my lack of posting recently; my work schedule is pretty horrific at the moment (up to 20 hours/day, over 100 hours/week).

I have managed to get up early and spend a couple of hours out with the camera before starting work on a couple of days this week; the Great Spotted Woodpecker family have been performing well with both adult birds feeding the nest regularly. I did also have an evening trip to the site in the week and unexpectedly found a Tawny Owl nest site too; a parent owl flying to the nest with a (very!!) large catch resulted in a lot of noise and excitement from the owlets and this gave the location away. I've seen at least four fledglings so far, all looking lovely and healthy.

Here's a snap of the adult male G.S.Woody. There are many more images to come; I'm doing a project on them with a certain shot or two in mind...

A slightly closer crop...

And a closer crop still!

Great Spotted Woodpecker pics

I went to see the G.S Woodpecker pair which have nested quite close to where I live. Both adults came surprisingly close and were quite tolerant of my presence. I took some pics and video and hope to be up bright and early tomorrow to take some more before work. Here's a few of today's pics:

Marsh Harrier again (better pics)

I thought I'd return to the Colyford Common hide for another attempt at photographing the long-staying female Marsh Harrier. It was quite showy but didn't come particularly close; the shots are better than the previous ones posted. If only I could edit a tail onto the bird in photo-editing software... hmm.

Contextual shot

Marsh Harrier over Axe Estuary

I finally had a few free minutes to catch up with the female Marsh Harrier which has been frequenting the area around Colyford Common up to Tower Hide. It never came close enough for a decent photo but I have an avid penchant for birds of prey so it's deserving of a place on the blog. Unfortunately the bird had nearly all of its tail feathers missing so it doesn't look all that aesthetically pleasing in the photos:

Ringed Plover on Black Hole Marsh

Just a quick post as I'm busy (hence the time of posting...):