My travels today meant that I had the chance to check out this site again this afternoon. A hen harrier was lingering in the same area for the whole of the couple of hours I was there, spending most of the time on the ground, in a ditch. This bird was very similar to the over-wintering Marston bird, a first winter, (which is still around). Despite the depressing state of affairs with regard to breeding hen harriers in Britain, it seems to have been a decent winter for them here, with several good inland records in our region.
I waited around, hoping for an owl but was probably a bit too early. A strong gust of wind blew my ‘scope over, a couple of adjuster knobs sheared right off- could’ve been worse, I suppose.
Five red kites, three kestrels and a couple of buzzards showed and two ravens got upset whenever anything else with wings came near them.
Brown hares were all over the place and a nice herd of fallow deer were near the wood.
lincsbirders 