Marsh Harrier Over Sussex Downs

Another glorious day and I headed out to Castle Hill, a local nature reserve. The site is managed downland and home to a number of interesting plants, butterflies, kestrels and numerous other species of bird. What I wasn't expecting to see (and at first I thought it was a buzzard), was this. The shots are all hefty crops as it was some way off, and I was deep in the valley when it flew overhead.
Marsh Harrier

That is an absolute first sighting for me, and I needed help on the identification. Apparently it's an immature (2nd year) male marsh harrier. I've occasionally seen reports of them in Sussex, but not in this area. It brings my local sightings of raptors (excluding escaped exotics and hybrids) up to eight: kestrels, sparrowhawks, peregrines, hobbies, buzzards, red kites, short eared owl and marsh harrier.

Of course there were other birds, including kestrels, and this charming little goldfinch. The bump near its eye is a tick.

The goldfinch was near a dew pond where, finally, I got some decent shots of common darters. I've missed them this year, but there were a fair number around the pond. This one was eating a greenbottle!

I mentioned that Castle Hill is a haven for butterflies. There were several meadow browns, and a red admiral flew past; but the photo is of one I'd not seen before. It's a small copper; and technically, that's two 'firsts' in one day.

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Camera note: all shots taken with the Canon 40D and EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L USM IS lens, with the exception of the two darter shots which were taken with the EF 100mm f/2.8L macro IS USM lens .

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This Post Has 16 Comments

  1. RobinL

    9 Oct 2010

    Congratulations on the "Firsts"
    Great shots!

  2. raniakasim

    9 Oct 2010

    for me i like the last photo , so nice one

  3. gdare

    9 Oct 2010

    We don`t have marsh harriers here, but I think they have them in Slovenia and Bulgaria. Or no one spotted it before.
    But darter look excellent :up:

  4. Dudley

    9 Oct 2010

    Awesome capture of the Dragonfly eating a fly!

  5. SittingFox

    10 Oct 2010

    Wow!! Excellent sighting of one of my favourite birds.

    Nice to see the invertebrates too 🙂

  6. anonymous

    10 Oct 2010

    Angela Smith writes:

    Great pictures, small coppers and darters were about here in Staffordshire today too, No Mardh Harrier though!

  7. Words

    11 Oct 2010

    Darko, I didn't realize we had marsh harriers here either (I know they are in other parts of the country). The darters were great (lots of them!)

  8. Words

    11 Oct 2010

    Adele, yes I was completely taken aback by the harrier 😀

  9. Words

    11 Oct 2010

    Rania, thanks. It was a very pretty butterfly, and not one I've photographed before.

  10. Words

    11 Oct 2010

    Erwin, thanks! It's always surprising just how much there is that is new.

  11. Words

    11 Oct 2010

    Andy, it was too busy crunching and munching to worry about the camera 😉

  12. Words

    11 Oct 2010

    Robin, thanks! The harrier was totally unexpected!

  13. Words

    11 Oct 2010

    Angela, thanks. The late burst of decent weather has certainly brought out the dragonflies. I had all but given up on darters for this year.

  14. Ukwildlife

    12 Oct 2010

    Great pics – love the darter close up

  15. Words

    13 Oct 2010

    Neil, thanks!

  16. Wulpen

    19 Oct 2012

    Thats a great shot of the M-Harrier yes its a great day for you :up:

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