The end of October brought a huge birding treat: my second-ever sighting of a Short-eared owl (and the first had been five years previously) so, though that sighting was the briefest of glimpses, I was over the moon (see Short-eared owl, 28 October). In the days following that sighting, the weather was not conducive to a return visit to the site but I got lucky when I did finally make it back, as the owl was still in the area.

As had happened previously, it was other birds – this time Magpies – that alerted me to its presence, and I was privileged to watch the bird for a longer period, in flight along the hedgerows, sitting in the middle of a ploughed field, flying again, and then cunningly sidling into a spot between a mound of grassy earth and the neighbouring hedge, where it blended so well into the background as to be nearly invisible. Magic!