Muddy feet

R and I were in Stratford this morning, where it was a pretty dreary day, and my resolve to go up to the owl field after we'd finished what we had to do in town was looking questionable. It looked even worse by the time I pulled out of Waitrose car park, after embarrassing myself hugely by dropping half a case of red wine as I was lowering it into my trolley, breaking one of the bottles and necessitating several members of staff rushing over to effect a swift clean-up. Not only was I mortified and grumpy, but the weather had taken a turn for the worse: the cloud bank had dropped almost to roof level, and it was now raining.

A fool's errand then. And yet.... 

I've been in this situation before, and it doesn't always end well, but sometimes the bloody-minded individualism of the Cotswolds weather gods can work in your favour. The problem is that from the base of the Edge you can't see all the way to the top of the scarp because it rises in a series of ridges, and you may have to cross several of these hills before you can be sure of the weather at your ultimate destination. Today the conditions continued to mirror my mood all the way to Temple Guiting, where it was still raining, but the village itself was picked out in what looked suspiciously like brightness, and there was a clear line showing at the base of the cloud above the next ridge. By the time I reached the owl field it was sunny, though it was pretty slimy underfoot, and there had obviously been some weather through earlier in the day.

For the next twenty minutes there was plenty of owl action, but nothing closer to me than this fly-past, which I caught within a few minutes of arriving. I was walking down towards the crossroads with a view to trying my luck along the main road, when I saw the owl coming towards a short break in the hedgerow where three other photographers were already standing. I started shooting from behind them, which can be quite annoying, but they were very nice, and hutched up enough in the narrow space to make room for me to come alongside. 

After this flypast the owl went off back into the middle of the field, and I moved on. Round on the main road I found Hillyblips and a couple of other owling friends, but no owls worth writing home about, and it was a full two and a half hours later, as I walked back along the lane in rapidly deepening dusk, that I saw the only other close action of the afternoon. It was lovely to watch a Shortie and a Barn Owl quartering so close to the wall, though sadly by then my ISO was so high that I doubt the photos will be recoverable, even with AI software.

It was only when I got the photos from this flypast up onto a big screen that I realised I wasn't the only one with muddy feet this afternoon. It's unusual to see a Short-eared Owl with such a grubby undercarriage, so I guess the field must be very wet indeed. These birds tend to roost on the ground in grass tussocks, and to that thought I can only say: rather them than me.