SHORT-EARED OWL over my house!

Sunday 6th September 2026.

The Short-eared Owl flying over my house early this morning. What an incredible start to the day!

Another dry and bright start early this morning as I was up at the crack of dawn again with a lot of very high patchy cloud and fairly mild too. A far better total of Moths in my garden this morning with double the number compared to yesterday. I was in for a dramatic surprise this morning when all the Gulls in the area went berserk! I could only assume it was a raptor flying over or a Grey Heron by the noise they were making.

There were at least 3 Yellow Wagtails heard flying over (never see the buggers!) and I was more than pleased with that, but when a Short-eared Owl lazily flapped overhead, I was in shock! Obviously a bird that was on migration and trying to suss out on which direction to go. The bird headed off west over the rooftops, but ten minutes later, the bird was seen heading back east and a little later, the Gulls and Pigeons all took off again and I could see it distantly heading towards Highland Road Cemetery.

Another lovely photo of the Short-eared Owl overhead.

I thought I had seen the last of it, but something told me to look up and sure enough, the Short-eared Owl was circling very high above and being accompanied by a Carrion Crow. Panic set in as I really wanted a photo for proof and so ran through the house, grabbed my camera and rushed back out into the garden and thankfully, the Owl was still circling high above my house. I managed a few half decent images and quickly put the details on the ‘Lazee Birders’ Whatsapp site. Not only was it a ‘year-tick’ but also a very, very good ‘Garden Tick’. It begs the question, how can you top that? The bird then flew off distantly south bound.

 

My Moth Box:

Flounced Rustic.

A total of 76 Moths of 28 species were recorded this morning, near double the number of Moths than yesterday and although there were no new Moths for the year, there was a good variety again.

Up to 4 Olive-tree Pearls were recorded this morning.

A garden record of 5 Clancy’s Rustics was recorded while other notable Moths included 3 Golden Twin-spots, Dusky Thorn, Plumed Fan-foot, Flounced Rustic, 4 Olive-tree Pearls (Palpita vitrealis) and both Beet Moth (Scrobipalpa ocellatella) and House Moss-moth (Bryotropha domestica) were my second individuals of the year.

Above, a Silver Y was one of the few migrants recorded and below, up to 3 Lesser Yellow Underwings were present.

Yes, the Short-eared Owl stole the show this morning, but I always enjoy checking out the Moths. The Moths recorded this morning included the following:

 

MACRO MOTHS	MICRO MOTHS
Clancy’s Rustic x5	Common Plume x1
Golden Twin-spot x3	Rusty-dot Pearl x2
Silver Y x1	Mint Moth x2
Double-striped Pug x6	Tree-mallow Tortrix x2
Lime-speck Pug x1	Light Brown House Moth x4
Pale Mottled Willow x6	House Moss-moth x1
Willow Beauty x2	Ruddy Streak x3
Dusky Thorn x1	Chevron Grass-moth x2
L-album Wainscot x9	Olive-tree Pearl x4
Bright-line Brown-eye x1	Beet Moth x1
Vine’s Rustic x6	Apple Leaf Miner x3
Plumed Fan-foot x1
Large Yellow Underwing x3
Lesser Yellow Underwing x3
Brimstone Moth x1
Single-dotted Wave x1
Flounced Rustic x1