Not one, but two !
A walk along the footpath beside Titchfield Canal can give you one of two things reference birdwatching; a good day or a bad day and this day was a good day !
I’d seen one Barn Owl there both last year and this year some two weeks earlier and after a lengthy walk down the path toward Titchfield Haven I returned with not much to shout about. I thought there’s a good chance of seeing the Owl in it’s usual tree house some 100 meters on the other side of a safely fenced field and close to the Car Park, I glanced up and hit the jackpot !
I’d timed it just right, after a few quick clicks, the one of the left made a hasty retreat.
Upon returning to the Car I sat down in satisfactory mode and had a Sandwich. Another Birdwatcher came up the path and as passing me said he’d heard about two Barn Owls but only seen one.
I have to admit I nearly said the infamous Birdwatchers favourite sentence of “You should have been here 10 minutes ago” but refrained and just said I’d mseen the two, showed him the photos on my camera and suggested he returned and waited.
About 400 meters to the south is another tree barely 20 meters from the Path and on many occasions one can see a Tawny Owl sitting there watching the world go by. I was lucky enough to get a rather poor photograph of one of it’s young last year, but alas, a shot of an adult Tawny Owl is yet to come.
