The Ring Ouzel has been an almost mystical bird for me over the last 50 years or so. I hadn't even seen one ever before today and I am glad to report that I was able to put that right. Not often a see a "Lifer" as the twitchers say. As is usual with this kind of thing it was as though there was nothing to it whatsoever and you would have thought that it was really normal and routine to see one. As soon as I parked the car and looked out over the meadow where it had been reported I could immediately see a Mistle Thrush and a Robin and there also, feeding just like a Blackbird, was the Ring Ouzel. My first impression was that it was really bulky and sligtly, if only a tiny bit bigger than it's cousin, (the Blackbird). It was feeding on the shorter areas of grass just like a Blackbird or Thrush would be when looking for garden worms. The bright white crescent on the breast shone out like a beacon. It scurried around, cocking it's head on to one side and then quickly pulled at the grass and roots to try and expose the worm or what have you, beneath. There were a couple of birders at the other end of the field and they immediately saw that I had it in my sights and they returned back towrds the car park and me. It seems that I was lucky after all and the bird had earlier been disturbed by children playing football and they hadn't been able to find it. I took loads of record shots but didn't want to walk towards it, that would have been bad form. In the end after the frustration of it being 50 yards away I just sat down with the camera low on the tripod and waited in the seemingly forlorn hope that it would walk towards me....... and it did. At last it was showing amazingly well and scurrying closer and closer to me. My luck was in but it was about to change! A family came through the lower gate and started to walk back to their car and the route that they had to take would bring them right up to the bird that was literally feeding on the short grass of the path that they were on. I cursed my luck at that pont but the bird got nearer still and I did manage some photos from very close. A small child, running ahead of the family party was the first to arrive and the bird flew up high and away to some tall trees to my right where it continued to curse noisily from the tree tops. It never did return to the ground and I rushed home to have a look at my pictures confident that I had at least got a new species for my Devon gallery.
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