As some of you will know I carry out bird surveys on two local farms for the VF&A section of RSPB. This means that I walk the farms each week, especially in the breeding season, and report my sightings so that it forms a small part of the overall data collated by the society.
Quite often, and in winter in particular, it means I get cold and wet ! However the rewards can be superb. Watching a buzzard get harried by a sparrowhawk is one such instance, another is seeing an adult wren feeding it's newly fledged young with insects. This year a highlight was seeing three newly fledged swallows sitting on the branch of a tree over a pond and the parent birds flying in to feed them without even stopping to perch.
The best so far though was to find barn owls breeding in a box up in the apex of - yes, a barn!
Not only that but seeing the four owlets ringed, thanks to Chris and his myriad contacts.
Last Thursday evening saw us assemble with the ringer and the farming family and watch the owlets brought daown in bags, weighed, ringed, sexed and their age determined. Did you know that barn owl chicks can be aged to the day by measuring the length of a primary feather from its unfurling point to the tip? These four were from 37 to 43 days old and they hatch at two day intervals.
Although late in the year for breeding ( it is thought that this is a second brood but not in the same site) the chicks were well developed and weighed between 350 and 450 grammes each.
They will fledge in another 30 or so days and probably be still dependant on the parent birds for another month after that.
It's sights and experiences like this that make it all worthwhile.
Enjoy the pictures
Phil Antrobus
1 comment:
And you didn't take me? I'm sulking now...not speaking.
SOB
Laura
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