I got to the clearfell, in which I gather it has been seen and after about twenty minutes, in which I walked the track along the top of the southern side, seeing nothing, I returned to the road, and immediately, spotted it on the north side. It never came particularly close, but was very active and gave good binocular views. I tried getting some memory shots with my B700, but they proved to be a dismal failure, as the light wasn't great and even when perched, it was constantly wobbling and waving about.
At one point it disappeared onto the ground for a while and when it flew back up onto a perch, it seemed to be struggling and I could see that it had caught something. As I said, the image is very poor, but is seems to show a small rodent in its bill. I can't see a tail, so I assume it to be a vole of some kind.
It would be great to find its larder can you revisit. It appears to have been a good year for small mammals as local kestrels (plus the Neuadd) have mostly been hunting from perches overlooking scrub/regrowth for months.
ReplyDeleteI shouldn't think I'll have the chance to go back there any time soon. The larder must be very close to the tree it was photographed in, as it dropped down from there and when it next appeared, it was without the vole. I know which tree it was, but I doubt if I could explain where it is.
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