A few bird pics

Due to popular demand, I'm going to try and update this blog at least weekly from now on (cough). I'll have to resort to photographing some less interesting subjects if this is going to happen... Sparrows and Starlings it shall be then (and others)! Ah well, better than nothing :-)

This Buzzard can reliably be seen on this perch at 7pm ish daily

Birds in Colyton (not Kingfishers this time!)

After the period of Kingfisher excitement, I've taken a few shots of some other birds at the River Coly.

Blackcaps: There are at least two families of these by the river. Can be seen frequently.

Grey Heron: Can be seen anywhere on the Coly. Chantry Bridge is best for viewing/photos if it's there.

Bullfinches: Seen a pair of these a couple of times now. Visiting the area briefly rather than going there regularly I think.

Treecreepers: These have done well by the Coly. Not hard to find, but determined not to be photographed.

Spotted Flycatchers: A pair of these appeared last week and can be seen near Heathayne. Another pair have nested next to a Colyton pub, The Gerrard Arms. Can be seen from the church path pretty much all daytime.

  

Dragonfly!! And more...

With the weather being pretty rough recently I had little hope of seeing many butterflies today. However, better still I stumbled upon a dragonfly, nearly literally. I noticed it just before it was about to get trodden on. This was pleasing as it's the first dragonfly I've seen this year (in my book damselflies do NOT count). Fairly unsurprisingly it was far too cold for the female Libellula depressa (broad-bodied chaser) to fly. So I took advantage and took a few snaps of her:

Onto the birds. Nothing too interesting here. Got some more shots of the (male) kingfisher, but they're not as good as previous ones so I won't bother posting them.
There was a Grey Heron over Chantry Bridge. I rarely complain about a subject being TOO close to photograph, but this one was. I had a fixed 300mm lens so had little choice but to take this...

That's not blown up post production, this is the size of the bird in the original pic!

And later on there were these:

And a hungry robin:

Kingfishers, best day yet!!

Today was my first COMPLETELY free day to do whatever I like since October 2010, so I thought there was no better way to spend it than down by the River Coly. I headed out early in the morning and got a few shots of the female Kingfisher. After this success with the female bird, I headed home for some lunch. This Buzzard is the only other semi-acceptable photo I took in the morning:

Nice bird! They're doing well in the Coly area.

So after some lunch, I headed back down to the Kingfishers, this time with the sun shining nicely on their main perching branch, downstream of the nest site. This extra light helped immensely with the photography side of things. Here is some photo technical details for those of you who are interested.

Male bird (pic shown below) taken at:
300mm
1/640 sec
f/5.6
ISO 100

So here's a shot of the male.

This is cropped.



Love these birds, (you can probably tell by now...) simply stunning.

Kingfishers

Same as yesterday, I headed out briefly after work and was again rewarded.



Definitely worth clicking on this one to enlarge it.

Something that no-one ever likes to see...

Firstly I'll apologise for not posting since January. This isn't through lack of desire, it's through lack of time!
I managed to take a few pics in a couple of free hours last weekend. Nothing interesting but better than nothing!
On a sad note, the pictures of the Sparrowhawk which are to follow are of an injured bird. I didn't get too close with the camera as I didn't want to terrorise the bird. Although a dog owner was letting her mutt do a good job of this as it was barking visciously at it... Thankfully not for too long!! The bird was caught and taken to the vets in Axminster (thanks to Allison Stenning) but it sounds as though it was going to be put down. It's left wing was broken. No other obvious damage though.

Sorry about the feeder shots, I was desparate!

(Black Redstart- Seaton Hole)

Colyton birding (nothing special)

Seeing as though I had some free time and it was actually sunny today, I headed out with a camera to see what I could find in the way of wildlife. Unfortunately this was a fairly boring and fruitless exercise... Here are a few of todays pics, mostly boring subjects I'm afraid (the exception being a Goldcrest which proved even more timid than usual, apart from when it landed about 50cm away which was too close for the lens to focus..... GRR!!!!!!!). 

You know a desparate photographer when you see one photographing common birds like these...