Returning from Hoy

I went to Hoy to try for the snowy owl found yesterday on the 'post road' track but, as per, had no luck. I texted the finder and she sent me a video of it in flight- I think seeing it in flight was the only real chance because there were 100s of single, white stones on the hillside that looked very owlish! Saw a merlin, kestrel, fieldfare, bar-tailed godwit. The man driving me over to Rackwick told me that the day before he had heard a racket from outside his house and when he looked out saw that a peregrine had just killed a magpie and another magpie was chacking in helpless rage at this. Common enough down south, we don't normally see magpies in Orkney ( I haven't seen one here in 10 years) so that that killing meant that the population had dropped by 50% in a moment.