Crowle & Thorne Moors......What A Day Out!....Friday 15th May 2020.

A plan to visit the Crowle And Thorne Moors complex today,to try and obtain some video of both Red Deer and Four-spotted Chasers certainly paid off and i also managed to find a cracking 2nd calendar year male Red-footed Falcon as a bonus.
 The following is a short account of the visit:

As i headed out of Crowle village towards the NNR,i was sure i could see a herd of Red Deer near the car park and sure enough there was,a whopping 54 animals.I was gob smacked how calm and not spooked they were as i parked up and quietly set my scope up and began to record some video with my phone.They seemed pretty settled in my presence and just quietly walked away as i videoed them.Perhaps it was the fact it was only just getting light properly and they were more confident with it being darkish still.
 Also in the field which used to hold the goats,was a lovely Barn Owl hunting,another lovely sight to see.
 As the Deer quietly dispersed,i got all my kit together for my day on the NNR and i began to head off hearing a lovely male Cuckoo as i walked.
 There had been a light ground frost again and i feared for the numbers of Odonata as it may have killed a few as i tramped through the wet grass.
 I passed over the bailey bridge onto Thorne and into gods own county,to the sound of a further 3 male Cuckoo,it was just so peacefull and a real privilege to be out.
 I eventually found some Four-spot Chasers and spent a good 30 minutes videoing and photographing them and i have added some of the photos and video clips on my Dragonfly sightings blog here @ https://LincolnshireOdes.blogspot.com .
 After enjoying the Dragons i walked around to Blue Bridge and sat and had a drink and something to eat.
 A quick scan around,saw a single Hobby hunting low down and perching on a post in the centre of one of the pools and i moved around there to try and get some video.I did achieve a short clip,but not as long as i would have liked.
 It was while i was waiting for the Hobby to return to it's perch of which it didnt,i noticed another bird gliding along low at some distance,which stalled and hovered briefly and i thought to myself 'Thats not a Hobby'.It proceeded to land on top of a Birch and i scoped it at 60x and it didn't have a white cheek patch,it WAS a male Red-footed Falcon.I edged closer as quick as i could and it disappeared again,thankfully though,after about 20 minutes,i relocated the bird,again perched.A very fast walk,almost run,saw me getting relatively close to the bird as it just sat there eating a Four-spot Chaser...at this moment i was in raptures,what a cracking bird and i had found it!.I saw it a further 2 times,the last at about ten past eleven,when it was in the company of a Hobby,where they were perched fairly close together.What a superb encounter and a new species for my self found list.
 In all the hurrying about,i had thankfully got some decent video footage,which will certainly confirm things enough for the YNU records committee.
 The rest of the visit was just totally relaxed after my nice little find and i look forward with anticipation to my next visit and more nice finds hopefully.

Red Deer,Crowle Moor.

Red Deer,Crowle Moor.

The Limstone Road,Thorne Moors.