What started off by being a birding trip to North Wales on Saturday night, quickly turned into something entirely different on Sunday morning? The reason, a first winter female Snowy Owl had been found in north Norfolk during the week and on Saturday had been seen in the Titchwell area, albeit a little distantly. The bird must have been blown to our shores, in front of the Beast from the East. Well our plans changed and with Kev C driving a full team left Rochdale around 7am. The weather was quite misty all the way there via M62, A1 and the legendary A17. The weather improved around the Kings Lynn area, but no news of the owl though. We had a look around the Dersingham bog area, but not many birds were stirring, so we headed off to RSPB Titchwell to see what we could find there.

  Now a text from a birding friend of mine soon changed our plans, it read Snowy Owl has been found at RSPB Sheringham. We were only 5 miles away, how often does that happen? We arrived at the car park at Snettisham, managed to park, grab our gear and set off following other birders. Myself and Steve B decided to take a little more time to walk the 2 miles to see the bird as the other lads walked at twitch speed. Upon arrival a line of around 50 birders, all stood on the boardwalk behind the hide, were watching the Snowy Owl. We managed to get in the line and watched the bird at around 80 yards distance. It was sat in the grass, possibly on prey, moving its head around, occasionally yawning and stretching its body occasionally, what a bird! We admired the bird for about an hour, Bob K wanted to stay until it flew (which would have been about 5 hours later) but the long walk back to the car had to be done as the weather looked like rain. Also at Snettisham: - Avocet, Skylark, Ringed Plover and a couple of Grey Partridge (expertly found by Steve B)

   Back to our original plan of visiting Titchwell, the weather was not so good so a spirited walk around one of my favourite reserves. Only a few Sanderling on the sea shore, but around 20 Mediterranean Gulls in the Black Headed Gull colony was very nice along with a hunting Barn Owl. Then as we were about to leave, a well-marked male Brambling had been found by Dave W on the bird feeders, ta for that Dave. We headed for home when another Barn Owl was seen by the A17 as the weather closed in reaching Rochdale by 8pm, quite a day.

Dave O.

-- Edited by David Ousey on Thursday 15th of March 2018 01:34:00 PM