Merlin

Walking along the North Downs, I raised my binoculars to identify a fast flying bird. Turned out to be a starling. As I lowered my bins, my eye was drawn to a small bird giving chase. It was clearly a Merlin. The only other possibility would be a hobby and it too early in the year for that to have been the case and a starling would probably have been too large a prey item. The Merlin continued to fly westwards and I suspect it is migrating back to the western hills where it still breeds. Having said that, the flock of linnets is still around and may tempt the merlin to stay around.