We certainly would not have chosen to make our winter visit to Elmley Nature Reserve during Storm Herminia. It was especially unfortunate because we were bringing our son and daughter-in-law with us to introduce them to all the wonderful wildlife that seeks sanctuary on the reserve over the winter months.

Twenty-five short-eared owls have been regularly roosting in a field alongside the reserve car park and I was hoping that we would get some really good views. As well as that, large numbers of marsh harriers would no doubt be gathering at the reedbeds to roost at dusk, which is always quite a sight. But unfortunately things didn’t go to plan and Storm Herminia raged her way across southern Britain for most of our stay, bringing with her strong winds and a lot of rain. It was raining heavily at dusk and we definitely did not see the harrier roost and nor did we see a single short-eared owl.

But despite all this wild weather, we still managed to have an enjoyable time.

At first we trudged around in the rain getting very wet, but the birds were sensibly hunkered down and very little was seen:

Warming up in the cow byre over lunch:

There is a two mile track through the marsh between the reserve entrance gate and the car park. You are requested to stay in your car and think of it as a safari, using the vehicle as a mobile hide. We decided that viewing the birds from the shelter of the car might be the best way to spend the afternoon in the circumstances, so we turned the heated seats in the Volvo up to max and took ourselves off on a marshland safari:

But the standout birding highlight for me was this long-eared owl roosting in a thicket by the car park:

Although I knew that there were long-eared owls on the reserve, I hadn’t expected to see one because they roost in dense cover and generally only emerge after dark.

Owls hate the wind and the rain and so, in the midst of Storm Herminia as we were, we failed to see the three species of owl that I had hoped to spot. Last January there had been plenty of short-eared owls on show:

We have seen barn owls on every other visit to Elmley:

A pair of little owls live amongst the ruins of the Old Schoolhouse and are ordinarily very easy to see:

The fifth and final British owl species is the tawny owl, but this owl is a woodland specialist and is only occasionally seen or heard in the marshland habitat at Elmley.

We do, however, regularly see tawny owls at our wood and in the meadows. For the sake of completeness, here are tawny owls that have appeared on our trail cameras this week:

We spent the night in adjacent shepherds huts whilst the tempest howled outside:

We awoke the next morning to some sunshine, although it remained very windy:

After breakfast we walked down to the bird hides, enjoying the sun but still battling against the wind:

Marsh harriers and kestrels were frequently seen over the marsh during our stay. There was also this buzzard:

As it flew, we saw that it had caught itself a bird:

It was still very windy down at the hides and few birds were about. However, it was nice to see some grey plover:

And a small group of snipe:

By the end of our trip, we had chalked up forty-six species of bird which is not bad given the state of the weather. But there is no doubt that Elmley had not been seen at its best, and I hope that our son and daughter-in-law will be prepared to give it another chance sometime soon.

We ourselves are already booked to return in May. The short-eared owls will be gone but there should be baby birds everywhere.