Andrew Parkinson/2020VISION
Identifying marsh harriers: Males are tricoloured with a buff head, grey wings and tail and a rufous coloured body. Females are brown with a cream crown, bib and breast. Juveniles are darker brown with mostly orange heads.
Harriers as a group are medium to large raptors in the bird of prey family. There are 16 species spread evenly across the world, excluding both the north and south poles.
Andrew Parkinson/2020VISION
Marsh Harriers are apex predators, they fly in the classic harrier shallow v style, gliding tirelessly through the air with methodical precision, using their exceptional eyesight and hearing to quarter their territory.
Being the largest of the harrier species they take a large range of prey, including wildfowl, waders and mammals suchas rabbits and young hares.
Both male and females perform spectacular skydancing displays in the spring, these displays include flying hundreds of feet up in the air performing summersaults, twists and turns, before dropping like a leaf into the reeds.
Gary Cox
During the breeding season these marvellous birds perform mid air transfers known as food passes, which entail the males calling to the female nearby as she rises from her nest to take the prey from him underneath.
Breeding begins anywhere between mid March - early May. The female lays between three and eight eggs, which are white in color with a blue/green tinge when first laid, the eggs are incubated for 31-38 days, and fledging takes place between 30-40 days after that.
Previously only a summer visitor to our shores marsh harriers have long since become resident year round, and have spread from their original strongholds in East Anglia across the country, even reaching as far as Scotland!
These birds are one of the great conservation success stories of recent times and are at their most bountiful in number in the UK for over 200 years.
If you want to see these one of these beautiful birds for yourself and live in Lancashire the best places include Carnforth, Morcambe Bay and our sister reserve Lunt Meadows.
