The Marsh Harriers in Early April

5th April 2024

We are now into the first week of April so time to see how the Marsh Harriers are getting on. I arrived at the Reedbed Hide and was surprised to see I had the whole place to myself. Not too surprisingly the first welcome was from the reliable resident male Reed Bunting singing from his favourite Elder bush right in front of the hide.

The harriers were less active today than on my last visit when they were spending some of their time nest-building. This time there was no sign of the female until the male arrived on site with prey, but instead of an aerial food pass the female got up and flew with the male out of sight behind the bushes where presumably the prey was transferred on the ground. This was probably due to the high winds.

Here are some shots of the female.

And here is the male.

But today the main event happened just outside the hide. The cut area of reeds to the left of the hide is flooded to a depth varying from a few inches to about a foot and on a couple of occasions I saw ripples and a large fish turning over and therefore assumed they were spawning.

Then a Heron, clearly with local knowledge, appeared from over the trees on the far side of the reserve, flew purposefullly over the reed bed and landed in the area of cut reeds in front of the hide.

It immediatley spotted something and took just 10 strides to the water................... 

.....................and BAM!!!!............a "don't tell him your name" Pike.

It struggled for a while to subdue the fish and get it pointing the right way................

......................and had to stop for a rest a few times.

And did it manage to get it down?...................of course it did!!!!

The length of a Heron's bill is about 6"and scaling from the photo this Pike is about 16" long which I suspect is about the maximum a Heron could manage.