Gary Howard and I decided to look for the White-tailed Eagle which had been present in the Old Basing area for the last couple of weeks, probably the same bird I had seen in December at Amberley but not a bird you could easily tire of viewing.
It was no more than an hour from home, so Gary came here on Friday evening and we caught up sinking a mere couple of flageons of ale in the pub before our early morning departure. 3 Tawny Owls were calling as we loaded the car and we arrived on site shortly before 7am. One other birder was already helpfully at the designated spot which was an elevated position looking north over a valley near Blacklands Farm, there was no real outlook to the South but this was definitely the best viewing position in the vicinty. The only downside.. it was next to a huge open farm cespit, which was full of liquid bovine output, attractively surrounded by a 'feature' barbed-wire fence with a bizarre side-show of a couple of dozen Magpies flailed on the barbs ! - possibly signifying a local ritual which results in attracting Eagles to the area ?
Despite the aromatherapy, we started to notch up a decent number of local birds Skylarks, Fieldfares, Yelllowhammer, Linnet, displaying Lapwing, Golden Plover, Red Kite, Buzzard (including and exceptionally pale individual), Kestrel, Little Egret a couple of Hares and Roe Deer ...... all very pleasant but no sign of the Eagle. We exchanged numbers with another birder who went to check the copses further south and later returned having had no luck. It was clear that the Eagle ranged over a fair distance but had typically been seen from the site we occupied. Five hours later, the numbers of birders (and interested locals) increased steadily, rather than the birds. We had drunk all the coffee and pretty much concluded that perhaps today was Eagle no-show day....... so we headed down to the New Forest. Just as we arrived at the forest, less than an hour later, a phone call from the birder we'd exchanged numbers with telling us he was watching the Eagle perched on the floor of the valley.... too late to go back .... maybe .. !!!!
Cursing over, we continued to Beaulieu Road, eat our garage lunch, spoke with some other birders, who appeared to have had a remarkably succesful morning in the Forest, then headed towards the territory where the Shrike had been seen. We glimpsed what we both thought was a male Hen Harrier that disappeared quickly behind some trees to be replaced by a Buzzard flying nearby .. a trick of the light ?, so we left it as uncertain. After a little searching we found the Great Grey Shrike hunting from some scattered Birches and very successfully cleaning up on large Bumblebees. We got good views, although not quite close enough for good pictures, but a very smart bird. Other birds in the area included Siskin, Lesser Redpoll and Bullfinch, but we were still bothered by the Eagle... So much so, that just after 3pm we headed back to Old Basing. The Eagle had not been seen since around 1pm so we did a few circuits of the lanes before settling back into our position next to the cespit... roll on dusk and save for adding Sparrowhawk, Redwing and a few other common species we lucked out on the Eagle.
We can look back and wish that we'd stayed on in the morning, but in all put in nearly an 8 hour shift at the favoured spot and endured the stench... just the way it goes !
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| View over Bishops Dyke, New Forest |
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| Great Grey Shrike - Bishops Dyke area Beaulieu, New Forest |
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