Redfoot Redemption 20th June 2020

I planned to go to Bernwood Forest this morning to search for Purple Emperor butterflies but the weather, as is often the case, was against me. Nevertheless I made my way there hoping that the sun might break through. Even at nine in the morning the car park was virtually full but I got the last place available and duly set off down the main track. I knew as soon as I commenced walking it was a lost cause as the skies were stubbornly grey and a chilly wind blew down the track. After an hour of futile searching and wandering around I knew the game was up and my search for Purple Emperors would have to wait for another day.

It was now 1030 but I had no wish to return home. I considered a visit to my local reservoir at Farmoor but there would be little to see and I baulked at a fruitless wander around its concrete vastness. I sat on a log and consulted my twitter feed and saw a very nice image of an immature male Red footed Falcon taken in Somerset and posted a few minutes ago.This sparked my interest and I checked RBA (Rare Bird Alert) to find exactly where it was in Somerset. The entry in RBA told me it was in an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty called Cothelstone Hill in the Quantocks, near Taunton.

There has been a notable influx of Red footed Falcons into Britain in the past month or so and they are still  arriving. The majority are in their second year of life and therefore will not breed this year so there is no urgency to get to their breeding area  and they usually remain for some days anywhere they find in Britain that is to their liking. Their annual migration is phenomenal, one of extreme long distance, spending the winter in southern and south western Africa, where they congregate in flocks of thousands in favoured areas and then moving northwards in spring to breed from eastern Europe across Russia to Siberia.

Then and there I decided to go to Somerset. It was a two hour drive but if, and it was a big if, I saw the falcon I would feel my day had been well and truly made. Red footed Falcons are lovely birds, in my opinion superior to our Common Kestrel. I was also keen to see one properly and close up. which this one apparently offered the opportunity to achieve, being described as 'showing well'. This would make up for the distant views I had of an immature female that had visited my own county of Oxfordshire some weeks ago. I had also declined the opportunity with Moth to go and see a first summer male at Lower Beeding in West Sussex a week ago, choosing instead to go to Lincolnshire to see a very confiding Blyth's Reed Warbler. It would be a form of redemption if I saw this first summer male Red footed Falcon in Somerset.

I have never been to Cothelstone Hill and had no idea about where the falcon might be on the hill so sent a message to Cliff who had posted the very nice image of the falcon on twitter and he very kindly sent me a detailed map of directions. I was all set.

The drive was comparatively straightforward and two hours later I passed through Taunton and then through a village called Kingston St Mary, winding my way ever upwards to reach the brow of a hill where I turned left and five hundred yards later turned into the car park on Cothelstone Hill. Saturday lunchtime was probably not the best time to look for a space in the car park and my heart sank when I saw a sea of cars before me but I managed to squeeze the car into a gap and got myself together. By luck a birder was just returning to the car park, having presumably been viewing the falcon. I gestured to the track he had come down and that led further uphill through some woodland. 'Is that the way to the falcon?' I enquired. 'Yes, you just follow it all the way up to the top. The falcon is showing well and you will see some other birders there' he told me, adding 'Keep an eye out for redstarts when you get to the more open areas.'

I set off up the broad track. It was uphill for some way from the car park but eventually I left the woodland, passed through a wooden gate and the topography became one of an open grassed landscape of gorse bushes, scattered small hawthorns and rides passing through extensive areas of bracken and bramble. At the summit of the hill were three immense trees and a bench on which two birders were sat. The view was stupendous with the Bristol Channel away to my right and the sweep of Somerset to my left. All very nice on another day but I had but one thing in mind, to see the immature male Red footed Falcon.

One of the birders on the bench told me the falcon had just flown off down the slope below us and I could see several other birders scanning the slope. I could hardly believe my bad luck but followed where they pointed and soon saw the distinctive grey shape of the falcon, not too far away, flying between two hawthorns. It disappeared and did not come back into view. Well at least I knew where it was and I had seen it but I wanted more than this.

No one seemed particularly interested in walking down further to get closer to it, if it was there, so I set off on my own, following grass rides cutting through the bracken and found the falcon perched on a bare branch at the top of a small hawthorn. It was preening and looked settled. 

The ride faded away to nothing, a dead end and it was a case of now walking into and through the bramble and bracken to get closer. I instantly regretted wearing shorts as the brambles wreaked vengeance on my bare legs and I amassed a nice collection of scratches but you ignore such things when you are single mindedly set on getting close views of such a lovely bird.

The falcon showed no concern about my making my way towards it and sat relaxed and content on its perch. I stopped where I considered it was close enough, so as not to chance scaring the bird into flight. The other birders who were still on the summit would not thank me for that. The falcon ceased its preening, looked about and then flew down to an area of short grass to seize a beetle and flew in a tight circle to return to the same perch to consume its prey. Its flight was fluid and elegant in the air, the falcon describing a smooth sweeping curve with its pointed wings.

For fully fifteen minutes I watched it from my vantage point in the bracken as it caught another beetle and then preened some more on its favoured perch but then it rose and flew uphill a short distance to perch on another bare branch at the top of another hawthorn where it could survey the adjacent open, pony cropped grass ride. I followed in the direction it had flown.

It quickly saw something and swooped down to seize it and returned to its perch. I just enjoyed the moment and taking images of it but I could feel rain in the strong wind and soon the summit was enveloped in low cloud and rain. The falcon sat on its perch while I cowered on the leeside of a hawthorn which gave me some shelter from the rain. The shower and the cloud would soon disperse on the wind as I could see the sun illuminating the distant land far below and beyond the rain. I would wait for the weather to improve and then resume watching the falcon which was just the other side of the ride. Fate however took its turn to confound my plans 

Some trailbikers came hurtling down the ride from the summit, noisily shouting to each other, close enough to the falcon's tree that it took fright, wheeling away on the wind up and over the summit. I waited for the rain to cease and then followed to where I assumed it had flown. 

The falcon was perched at the top of a hawthorn a little way down the other side of the hill but then took off and flew directly over my head, back to the hawthorn it had been scared from by the trailbikers. On the way it hovered in the wind, kestrel fashion, looking down on the ride, before landing on the tree. The rain and cloud had cleared just as rapidly as they had arrived and it was now reasonably pleasant once more. The falcon remained on its perch for ten minutes, swooping down yet again to catch a beetle, clutching the unfortunate creature in its foot and consuming it once back on its perch. It flew again but not very far, back to its original perch, the one where it was when first I arrived. It became obvious that this small area was its favourite, presumably as the open grass rides afforded it ample opportunity to look for prey. 

Closer and closer I edged, taking careful step after careful step until  I was as near as I wanted to be to the falcon, which continued to show no anxiety. I found a small depression in the bracken so that I could stand with only my head and shoulders above the bracken. It was ideal as it reduced my profile not that I think it mattered as the falcon was well aware of my presence and was, as they often are when they arrive in Britain, untoubled by a human presence 

I took any number of images and just hoped they would be satisfactory. Then I stopped and watched it in my bins, buffeted by the strong gusts of wind, balancing its body on the slender twig on which it was perched, facing into the wind.

Although a predator they have what you could call 'a nice face'. Not the fierce uncompromising frown of an eagle or hawk's brow but a gentle benign look, the eyes large, soft, dark and liquid but with an innate intensity, the bill petite on its small rounded head. 

The plumage indicated this bird was a first summer male, its plumage in transition from the juvenile feathers of its first year of life to being replaced by adult ones. When fully adult in its third year it will be all grey with chestnut undertail coverts and thighs, orange legs and feet, bare orange skin around its eyes and an orange cere above its small hooked bill. The tail feathers were still juvenile apart from two adult feathers having replaced a juvenile feather in the centre of its tail  and another on the outer edge, while another or was it two, appeared to be moulted but not yet replaced, leaving a distinct gap in the centre of the tail when spread. The flight feathers were all retained juvenile feathers betrayed by the fact they were worn and brown on the upperside and barred on their undersides. The breast still retained the orange wash of a juvenile which presumably will be moulted out as the bird adopts its full adult plumage.. Its legs and feet were a striking orange and they will become more intensely coloured with age as will the cere and the bare skin around the eye.

The falcon takes flight showing the barred juvenile flight feathers in wings and tail. Note the two grey adult tail feathers in the tail having replaced the juvenile ones and the gap in the centre of the tail where two feathers are missing presumably to be replaced by adult ones

Slowly and carefully I retreated back through the bramble and bracken, leaving the falcon to its solitary vigil and made my way to the main ride. The falcon doubtless watched my departure but now others had arrived to look at it so it was their turn to enjoy the falcon. I left them to it but not before encountering a fine male Redstart, its alarm calls leaving me in no doubt about its concern at my presence near to its recently fledged young.

I retreated  further, heading for the summit but as I did the falcon joined me, flying past to land on a hawthorn close to me. I am sure if you had a mind you could almost walk up to it and it would remain where it was but I had done very well, I felt fulfilled and there was no need to do anymore.