It nearly ended in tears after bumping into Geoff Holmes who with 'John' (sorry didn't know your surname) had witnessed a Short-eared Owl being flushed by a tractor taking the tops off the arable field crop! It had flown high but then appeared to drop on the north end of the reserve! Geoff and I checked the viewable hedges / marsh whilst John made his way to the north end via the fen hide. What we didn't realise was 1) He refound it 2) He assumed we had seen it too! We hadn't and eventually (30 mins later), found the right vantage point and we were on it - tucked away on a fence post amongst some saplings and almost impossible to view! But once you knew where it was....
"It's behind the Teal in flight" :-)
At this stage a decent image to secure the ID was needed and with a bit of luck, after moving up the access road, we found a gap in the hedge from which much clearer views were obtained - despite the annoying branches which were totally impossible to avoid!
It didn't do much, clearly alert and not budging from the post!
In fact it was still rooted to the post at 6.15 when the light had totally gone and rain was falling, Dave C and me called it a day...
