Environment

Honey buzzards make second surprise UK invasion

by amyjudd | September 16, 2008 at 01:57 pm

702 views | 0 Recommendations | 13 comments

When a mass migration of honey buzzards occured over England eight years ago, it was described as a 'once-in-a-lifetime-experience'.

However, eight years later, it has happened again.

Only a few dozen pairs of these 5ft wing span summer-visiting birds of prey nest in Britain and on a typical mid-September day the national sightings barely reach double figures.

So clearly something extraordinary was in progress when there was a sudden flood of reports from every coastal county between Northumberland and East Anglia.

Most are believed to be the youngsters of birds nesting in forests across northern Europe that have been drifted off course by recent bad weather after beginning their migration to Africa for the winter.

Normally birds of prey do not cross large expanses of water, so what happened in 2000, was thought to not be able to happen again in the same generation.

On average more than 5,000 honey buzzards migrate over Falsterbo, an island in the narrow gap between southern Sweden and Denmark each autumn. Over the four days before the UK arrival more than 400 had been counted there

Normally they would remain over the European mainland as they continue south but that route could well have brought them in contact with the deep depression that had recently deluged Britain with heavy rain.

Bad weather over the North Sea could have caused them to come back to the UK.

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Irishphotographer

at 15:36 on September 16th, 2008

Camera Panasonic FZ30 with Raynox 2.2 tele converter full zoom =920mm at 150 Meters Distance not the sharpest picture but a great memory !

One of my major hobbies is watching Birds of Prey , i have been watching a particular pair of Buzzards for 5 years now and each year they successfully rear a pair of chicks.On this occasion i was lucky enough to get this hunting shot a very rare sight as they are very secretive around the nest.

Irishphotographer has contributed a photo to this story.

T_Monk

at 20:51 on September 16th, 2008

shot in bangalore, south india. May not be relevant to the honey buzzzard migration study though. they are seen here throughout the year.

T_Monk has contributed a photo to this story.

Feenseeschwalbe

at 21:11 on September 16th, 2008

Hi Jessica,

please feel free to use the photo for this purpose. The migration of these amazing birds is a great topic to write about.

Best wishes,
Gaby

Feenseeschwalbe has contributed a photo to this story.

pe_ha45

at 21:25 on September 16th, 2008

Hi Jessica,
thank you for the invite. Feel free to use this photo.
Peter

pe_ha45 has contributed a photo to this story.

Mionismarion (not verified)

at 22:49 on September 16th, 2008

Hi..

Please don't use my photos like this. Please don't request any photos from me in the future.

Actually my photos were taken in in a Zoo and are not for use on this site.

Greetings,

Marion

mk_lynx

at 23:32 on September 16th, 2008

Every spring and autumn quite good numbers of honey buzzards migrate also over Slovenia. However, this female was breeding in the Dinaric forests of Mt. Snežnik.

mk_lynx has contributed a photo to this story.

halee1953m

at 00:39 on September 17th, 2008

Shot in Port Dickson, Malaysia.

halee1953 has contributed a photo to this story.

vishaljadhav

at 04:46 on September 17th, 2008

Found at a waterhole in peak of a summer afternoon,

vishaljadhav has contributed a photo to this story.

Danny2100

at 06:25 on September 17th, 2008

This sub adult is the only known OHB this season which did not migrate backto its usual breeding ground. It is regularly spotted around the Northwestern region of the island . Hopefully it will join up the large flock that will come this way soon.

Danny2100 has contributed a photo to this story.

tominadel

at 08:40 on September 17th, 2008

No problem sharing the photo; It is nice to here of another exodus of these wonderful raptors to U.K.. Bird on, Jessica!

Tom

Brian Unwin (not verified)

at 07:40 on September 22nd, 2008

See this story as it originally appeared in The Daily Telegraph - by me - by visiting http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?xml=/earth/2008/09/16/eabuzzard116.xml

Incidentally Honey Buzzards are continuing to pass over Britain ten days after this movement started. Today (September 22) there have been reports of birds in Buckinghamshire, Cumbria, Dorset, Gloucestershire and from the Isles of Scilly off Land's End, Cornwall.

Brian Unwin, freelance journalist

pateluday

at 09:37 on September 25th, 2008

Honey Buzzard at Kanha National Park in India.

http://tigersafari.blogspot.com

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spOt_ON

at 19:48 on September 27th, 2008

I came across this bird very near to Kelana Jaya Lake Park, a public park near to my home. Kelana Jaya is a suburb in Petaling Jaya in the state of Selangor, Malaysia. I was attracted by the huge mass up in a tree completely barren of leaves. Lucky for me my telephoto lens could zoom to 300mm. to capture this lovely beauty. Unfortunately this very tree is no longer there. There has been some housing development around and it was fell the next time I came around.

spOt_ON has contributed a photo to this story.