Montagu's Harrier over Seaton (better pics from April)

I had a bit of a play around with the pics of the Montagu's Harrier which put in a brief appearance over Colyford/Seaton on 26-04-2013. I just cropped and compressed the original files when I put up the initial post. I've since processed them in Adobe Lightroom 4. By processed I mean use the RAW data from the original file to optimise noise reduction and sharpness detail etc; no actual image manipulation involved. Here's the best two:

In my original post HERE I mentioned that the pic was approx 2% of the area of the original photo so the bird is obviously significantly less. Here's what the original of the pic just above looks like (proves that when I say distant or short lens, I mean it!):

That is 'Large' on the pic formatting as with the other two pics above.

Colyton. Fledglings. Red Kite. Loads more. Enough said?

Well the Robins certainly grew up fast! Here's a pic of them a couple days ago...

And these are from this evening:

5 successfully raised and out and about :) roll on brood #2

Whilst I was out photographing these little'ens, I heard the gulls from CeramTec go up so poked my head around the corner to see what had caused the upset. It's usually just a Buzzard so I was shocked to see this (shabby) beast flying by:

I had the short lens on for the Robins and the Red Kite wasn't exactly close so the pics are TERRIBLE. It's my first of the year so I'll let them have a place on the blog anyway.

Following this excitement I had my daily scout around the Coly to see how the breeders are doing. Still no sign of young Kingfishers or Dippers, but the adult Dippers are taking HUGE quantities of food to the nest so things are looking good. I had a brief view of a Sparrowhawk flying over:

Once the light was getting a bit desperate I headed home and was greeted with this sight:

More avian porn for the blog!

And here's a couple of pics from the weekend. Also worth mentioning that I had a Hobby fly North over the Coly (pics un-blog-worthy).

A rather chilly Orange Tip which posed long enough for me to lie on the ground and compose the shot

Robin Diary #2

Our nesting Robins are doing well with at least 5 chicks growing fast and looking healthy! Hopefully they'll be out and about within the next week or so.

New life on the Coly

I couldn't see the Sanderling which was posing beautifully on the beach at Seaton as I was working. Every one of these has appeared whilst I've been working, and as such I've (perhaps surprisingly) never actually seen one!
However, once out from work I spent the evening by the River Coly again and found some recently fledged Chaffinches. One of the Kingfishers was out and about again but no sign of the female. I also found both Dippers away from the nest but feeding it regularly. Perhaps these are slightly further along into their breeding than I first suggested! I'm just hoping that the Dippers and Kingfishers fledge soon and do so successfully, with as little disturbance from the dreaded Coly dog walkers and screaming children as possible (grumpy old sod I know). The only pic I took that's worth posting is of this rather smart Nuthatch; not a common site in the Coly area.

And here's a slightly better pic of the Osprey from the Axe towards the end of last month:

KINGFISHERS MATING !!! A special moment

With yesterdays walk revealing some interesting things about local Kingfishers, I decided to go straight from work to the River this evening. I was waiting near one of the quieter areas (i.e. where most people don't go and disturb the birds) and heard two very vocal Kingfishers. I poked my head up out of the cover and saw this amazing event:

This is very interesting given what I discovered yesterday... I'm not going to elaborate on this as:
a) Kingfishers are protected by law and most local people (I'm sorry to say) who are apparently 'interested' really don't have a clue how to be subtle or go about seeing birds without disturbing them.
b) I don't want people knowing where my preferred area is or more importantly, where the nest site is.

This post is to show those who are interested that their has been at least some Kingfisher success, rather relieving after last years breeding attempts were hideously disrupted with frequent severe flooding. So, GOOD NEWS.

Good day for pics, and good news from a River Coly catch up

As the male Wheatear at Seaton Marshes were rather elusive yesterday evening, I thought I'd give them another go this morning. Unfortunately they didn't hang around after the fall of 15 from yesterday, with me finding exactly zero! I headed over to Black Hole Marsh to see if anything was posing nicely for the camera; I was hoping for Whimbrel, Ringed Plover and/or Dunlin up nice and close but there was nothing of interest at all (there were 3 fly-over Whimbrel but this isn't exactly what I was after). I resorted to scanning the hedges to see if any of the Warblers fancied showing. They didn't, but this pair of Reed Buntings gave me a nice show for 10mins or so. I had to crawl around on the floor to get close sometimes, but it was definitely worth it.
It's worth clicking on all of these to get an enlarged view; especially the (ringed) female in pic #4.

After spending some time with these stunners the morning was gone. As planned, I spent the rest of the day exploring the River Coly to see how the usual breeders are getting on. 2 of the 3 Kingfisher sites are still destroyed and abandoned, but the 3rd has life! It appears one of the Kingfisher pairs managed to rebuild as I saw both the male and female birds flying to and fro with fish, so the eggs must have hatched a good few days ago if the adults are leaving the nest unattended. Exciting stuff! Hopefully we'll get a few more flood free weeks to ensure a successful fledging this year (private locations). I only saw the one Dipper, but it was also to-ing and fro-ing with food, so I guess the eggs are recently hatched and one adult is doing all the work whilst the other sits on the nest. Fingers crossed both pairs succeed!

The only non-bin job pic I took by the Coly was of this rather striking Linnet:

An evening at Seaton Marshes and Black Hole Marsh

Finally starting to feel slightly less terrible, I headed out with the cameras this evening to have a bit of a catch up. I started with a quick look around Seaton Marshes where there were quite a few Wheatear; none came particularly close so this is the best I could manage:

I then popped over to Black Hole Marsh and was disappointed that the Whimbrel were no longer there, presumably they stayed on Colyford Marsh for the whole day (they were seen there in the morning). A nice Bar Tailed Godwit made a brief appearance before being hassled and eventually chased off by the Black Tailed Godwits:

If I feel up to it, I plan to have a serious study of breeding birds on the River Coly tomorrow. I'm hoping at least one of the Kingfisher pairs (private locations) managed to turn things around and rebuild a nest site. I'm also looking forward to seeing how the Dipper pair which have already featured on this blog this year are getting on. Hopefully there'll be some good news to report on this.