Short-eared owls : West Wales

Yesterday Fri 25th November myself and 'togger' friends Dave Gilbert and Mal Durbin from the Rhondda made a trip down to West Wales in search of Short-eared owls calling in at Kidwelly Quay on our way.

Kidwelly was fairly quiet with only the usual birds to be found and most of those were distant.

After a quick coffee and a sandwich and with Mal at the wheel we pushed on to our destination and after a good search of our target area we found two 'Shorties' hunting some rough pasture fields in the last couple of hours of daylight.

We 'filled our boots' as the saying goes and after taking some 500 or so photos before the light faded we called it a day and set off for home.

The three of us were more than happy with the images that we came away with.......

'A visit to the beach'

 Last Friday 18th November saw me make a visit to Aberavon Beach where in the past I've been lucky enough to see and photograph Great Northern Diver and Snow Bunting over the years.

A walk up the River Afan failed to turn up a GND and a walk along the beach almost as far as the River Neath in search of a Snow Bunting was similarly unproductive.

I had to be content with a single Purple Sandpiper and three Turnstones on the 'Jackstones Pier' which were very confiding and I obtained some images that I was really pleased with.

There may have been additional birds of each species present but they are not easy to find amongst the concrete 'jackstones' which act as a breakwater........

'You just can't beat a Little Owl'

 I checked out a couple of Little Owl territories yesterday morning in South Glamorgan in company with good friend and fellow birder/togger Dave Gilbert and his 12 year old grandson Jenson who is quickly becoming a first class birder and photographer.

We had no success at one site but a bird showed wonderfully well at the other site and we all captured some images that we were thrilled with.......

Little Gulls : Ogmore Farm, Ogmore-By-Sea

 Last Friday 11th November I made an early afternoon visit to Ogmore hoping to catch up with the two 1stW Little Gulls that had been there for a couple of days.

I searched in totally the wrong place at first making my way down the river to the estuary without any success. I then phoned fellow 'togger' Mike Pugh from Porthcawl who had posted some nice images of them on social media and Mike advised that they were to be found at Ogmore Farm up river from the sewage works bridge.

 A female Kingfisher perching on the rocks at the edge of the river on my way back although distant was a bonus.

I jumped in the car and made my way up river and parked by the castle bumping into Paul Denning who was just leaving, Paul provided some info and a walk down river of about 150m got me adjacent to the horse field that the two birds were favouring.

The gulls were were doing circuits of the field and I 'filled my boots' with flight shots until the light started to fade and it was time to leave..........