The Wednesday Walk and a few other lucky visitors were treated to a twenty minute battle between our pair of Peregrines and an unlucky female Teal out on the Target Pools this morning.

After diving on the throng of duck, the natural instinct for the likes of Teal and Wigeon is to fly straight to water where they know that as a rule the Peregrine will not follow. Both adults were haranguing the duck and inevitably some of the Teal try splash diving to evade capture.  However the water out there is not that deep and escape under water is not easy with a Peregrine trying to imitate a Kestrel just above where you have gone under.

Dive! Dive!

Time for a breather...

Another go...

Every time the Teal re-emerged the Falcon would go in and the duck would flap and go under again. The Teal knew that if it took off it was doomed and so kept trying to evade capture under water. The patience of the Falcon was eventually rewarded and the exhausted duck made a final attempt to escape and was plucked from the surface before being taken to the grass to be plucked once again.

Got it...

'Well done love'

The Tiercel had been present the whole time but could only watch on as his stronger and heavier other half took the quarry and the glory. I suspect that he was making lots of noise once she got her talons into the Teal but the chances of her sharing her lunch with him were zero.

Not sharing...

All these shots were taken by Joanne Josephine at considerable range and she did very well to capture the story!

30-12-15