'Boom Boom'

I think as Photographers we all have a nemesis species. Mine has always been the Bittern, I had great views of an over wintering bird at Slimbridge one year way in the distant past, before I took up photography to the extent that I do now. In the 4 or 5 years since I have been teased with glimpses and empty promises. Even the bird that flushed from the edge of the reed at the bottom of Mum and Dads garden didn’t hang around long enough for me to photograph. Maybe the fact that I almost stood on it and quite possibly almost s**t myself as it erupted from the riverside in front of me contributed to the fact it never got its picture taken. This also almost resulted in a very nearly broken camera lens as I almost lost grip of my tripod.

Locally seeing Bittern is a bit of a gamble, like looking for a needle in the haystack and various other cliches. Without any large areas of reed bed nearby the best to hope for is a flyover or flushing a bird passing through from the edge of the river. So the best place to head to see them every winter is Blashford Lakes on the south western edge of the New Forest. A bit of a drive from my local patch at about 45 miles but well worth it for the wide range of other diverse wintering wildfowl and woodland birds. The Ivy North hide overlooks a relatively small area of reed that fringes the quite large Ivy Lake. Each winter from November on wards reports usually appear daily of individual Bittern crossing the cut channels in the reeds. On a fair few occasions’ two birds had been reported so any time I am in that area during the winter months I always try make an effort to visit and spend a little time in the Ivy North hide to see if I can spot one.

Now as with most big reserves, hides that only have a few open windows are usually taken pretty quickly, with a photographer camped out in them day in day out for weeks upon end. The Ivy North Hide is most definitely one of those kind of hides. With only the two side windows opening, each are always taken. In the past 4 years I have probably visited at least a dozen times. Having to make do with peering through the murky tinted glass as the clear views are protected religiously by most usually extremely rude ‘Togs’. Most visits I have not seen anything nor has anyone else that I have spoken too, but on a few occasions you get the typical response oh you missed it by 5 minutes. I’m sure these campers take satisfaction in saying that to someone like me, just to ruin my day!

So fast forward to February 2016 and I still hadn’t seen a Bittern posing nicely in front of my lens. It was an extremely drizzly and murky Sunday. My girlfriend was at work, and I was sat at home bored off my t*ts. I thought I know I’ll go and have a look in the hides at Blashford, it was such a sh**ty day that I didn’t hold up much hope of any taking any photographs so I only took my 400mm lens, manily so I didn’t have to lug around my heavy tripod. As I drove down the M27 the light got worse, it was cold and I was generally still feeling increasingly more miserable. On arrival at Blashford I wandered off to the Ivy North Hide first and was shocked to find that it was empty, a luxury I had never encountered before. I perched myself down on the bench, got my camera setup and gazed out of the open window at the drizzle cloaked reed bed.

The whistle of hundreds of Teal and the odd squeak of a Moorhen the only noise to break the stillness of the day. A few brave souls came and went, eager to get out of the cold, but soon finding the hide didn’t offer much of a respite. Several times I considered moving on, but then thought to myself it’s not like I had anything else to do. The Minutes ticked by into an hour, I continually stared out at this gap in the reed bed where the reed was cut shorter. Nothing moving at all, more minutes ticked by and still I had the hide to myself when eventually I registered some movement. The gap was no more than 30 feet away but already halfway across it was a bloody Bittern. Finger to the shutter button I clicked away best I could as this skulker worked its way in slow motion across the small gap.

This was about the time I wished I had my big lens. Although the 400mm is perfect for handholding it hasn’t delivered the images I was expecting when getting it. Trying to shoot this prehistoric looking bird perfectly camouflaged against the dying reed was proving difficult. Even more so when it caught a fish, a fair size Jack Pike I think. I couldn’t work an angle to get a clear shot as odd strands of loose reed covered either the head or eyes, I guess that’s the restriction from photographing from a set position and a hide with only one window. Anyhow I got some great views of this shy bird and some photos to match.

It was even better to have the hide to myself and to witness the whole encounter on my own. Even if I had become one of those hide window hogging a**sholes I mentioned earlier! 

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New Year, New Start

So it is a New Year, well already nearly 2 months down in the New Year, but I have been very neglectful of my blogging over the past 6 months or so. So 2014 is hopefully going to bring with it a conscious effort by me to keep this going.

Where to start? Well with flooding in the South adding a lot of water to usual habitats, birds seem to have been a bit sparse to come by. An early January visit to Blashford Lakes seemed a good idea, with a clear day forecast the lure of photographing the Starling Murmuration against a setting sun was to much, and it would also be a great location to get year list up and running.

Lots of birds about and highlights of the day included Black Necked Grebe, Goosander, Goldeneye and a lone drake Red crested Pochard all good additions to the year list. Plenty of birds were making full use of the Woodland hides feeders with Siskin & Lesser Redpoll regularly visiting the Nyger seed. To my surprise I manage a new lifer from the same spot as a birder next to me on the bench got rather animated at a couple of the Redpoll, slightly larger paler and less streaky, my first Mealy Redpoll. With a cracking sunset setting the sky a glow all that was required was the Starlings. On my last visit over the Christmas period 30,000 came into roost on a dull day. Tonight nothing! Just my luck, the sunset was pretty special though.

Coal Tit

Blue Tit

Grey Wagtail 

Female Siskin

Female Siskin

Avon Valley Sunset 

No Starlings :-(

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Spring Round Up - May 2013

I made several other trips out and about in May, again to look for the Brown Hares locally but without much success. A unusual random Holiday day from work found me down at Pennington & Keyhaven Marshes on the South Coast on the look out for some Spring Migrants, which proved very successful in the form of my first ever Little Tern.

The trip back across the New Forest to Blashford Lakes was well worth it as a Greenshank fed right in front of the hide, another hide show off was one of many newly arrived Reed Warblers. To top the day and month off a Nightjar survey on Greenham Common in Newbury gave me my first Nightjar 'Churring' experience.

Brown Hare 

Little Tern

Greenshank

Reed Warbler

Roe Buck

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First's For Me - 27th Jan

So I get a message late on the saturday afternoon from Joe at - This Isn't Portland Birding asking if I fancy going for some unusual Hampshire visitors the next day. Bewick's Swan, Tundra Bean Geese & Green winged Teal all possibles. With the sun out and shining by midday we arrived at the Avon floods at Harbridge, after geeing himself up Joe did manage to drive through the puddle that flooded the road, and we quickly found our way around to a roadside field covered in Mute Swans.

Ditching the car on the side of the road we were soon peering over the 5-bar gate into the corn field beyond. Turns out the dairy farmer was also present spreading the field in a fresh covering of cow shit. As if the smell of the country wasn't enough to contend with, a chainsaw started in the hedgerow on the opposite side of the field causing the majority of the Swans to take flight and disappear. I did manage to pick out 3 Bewick's in amongst the blur of white. I must admit the sound of 35 or so Swans wingbeats at close range is quite something.

The Bean Geese had been seen in the same field the night before, but no sign on this occasion so we spent quite a while scanning the distant floods, and trying to pick out the Greylag & Canada Geese to no avail. Plenty of Wigeon, Teal, Lapwing & Starling all making use of the extra waterways.

We braved the flooded road again and parked up on the Bridge to have a good look from a different angle. The Bewick's reappeared no more than 70 yards away and gave some nice views, my first outside of the Slimbridge grounds.

Giving up on the Geese we drove the mile or so down the road to Blashford Lakes, Joe had spent the majority of Saturday afternoon scanning for the Green-winged Teal so thought we would have another bash from the Ivy north screen. Finding a GWT in amongst c.2000 other Common Teal isn't an easy task, and after an hour or so we gave up. Plenty of Canada Geese, Gadwall, Moorhen, Coot and the odd Pochard also on the Ivy lake.

Walking back towards the car we picked up the two Black-necked Grebes on the Rockford lake, at a relatively viewable distance along with some more Pochard, a dozen or so Goldeneye and a lone Kingfisher. The pathway back to the car also brought a couple of Bullfinch the male look stunning a top the nearest tree.

From one side of the Forest to the other, I had been meaning to visit Mercer Way in Romsey for some time in the hope of seeing the wintering flock of Hawfinches. Numbers logged on GoBirding had peaked at 35, so hopefully the chance of seeing my first had pretty good odds. We turned up in the middle of this housing estate and headed over to a small park area of rough grass and a few trees beside the canal. I must admit I wasn't overly confident that the UK's most illusive finch would be here in abundance.

Spying a group of birders over the far side we headed over, they were watching a Brambling low down in the brambles by a nearby puddle. Joe's finely tuned ear soon picked up the call of some birds in a small clump behind us, so we left the small group to there brambling and soon picked up 4 or 5 Hawfinch in amongst the trees. Its not until you see this bird in the flesh do you realise how huge they are. Several came and went, flying in and out ever 2 or 3 minutes, occasionally dropping down to drink from a muddy puddle.

Unfortunately getting photographs isn't the easiest, although they were quite prone to sitting proudly on the branches of certain trees, there always seemed to be a lot of debris in front of the bird. So no clean photographs, and I apologise for the quality of this one but I had to post, my first ever Hawfinch!

Hawfinch

So not a bad day out all in all, 2 new 'Lifers' for me in the form of Black-necked Grebe & Hawfinch, and Joe even managed to catch up with the Green winged Teal a week or so after. Joe's GWT

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Blashford Lakes - 13th Jan

With plenty of new additions to the year list in the bag we headed back through the New Forest to finish the afternoon off at Blashford Lakes, Hants Bird News had been logging 2 Bittern for the past fortnight or so, so the odds of seeing 1 had to be good right?

I wasn't really expecting to pick up an new ticks but the shear number of wildfowl out on Ibsley water was something to behold. c.900 Shoveler, c.300 Greylag Geese which happened to erupt from the water and fly straight towards the Hide windows. 

Cormorant, Tufted Duck and a few Pintail were dotted in between the Shovelers, I also managed to pick out a couple of distant Goosanders, trying to get a count when 2 drakes flew straight past the hide. I did get another tick after all!

2 Out of focus Greylags, ruining or making the picture?

Greylag flyby

Leaving Ibsley Water behind we headed across the road to try for the illusive Bittern in the Ivy North hide. The words you most definitely don't want to hear when entering a hide are "your 2 minutes too late, its just walked right across that open channel and into the reeds". 45 minutes later, and we are still watching a small area of reed bed, about 10ft across.

Too say I was a little pissed off would be an understatement, the brief visit of a Kingfisher outside of the hide window did nothing to lighten my mood, which got progressively worse as I headed home Dad had great pleasure informing me that he had just flushed a Bittern from one of the small areas of reed alongside the River. What a patch tick that would have been!

Overall I guess it couldn't really put to much of a dampener on what was a cracking day for species and weather! 56 logged throughout the day.

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Blashford Nuthatch

As previously posted with the Blue Tits, the Nuthatches were also not at all bothered by my presence near their feeding station. It was quite nice to get a few shots of a Nuthatch in its natural surroundings rather than on the side of a feeder.

Nuthatch

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Blashford Blue Tits

Just outside the Education Centre at Blashford lakes are a few more feeders, placed a little more out in the open than near the hides. I tucked myself next to the Footpath sign about 5 feet away from the feeder and 7-8 feet from the tree which stands next to it. 

I thought if anything I was a little too close as both Blue Tits, Great Tits and Nuthatches flew in like arrows to the feeder not taking a blind bit of notice of me moving my camera up and down as they took off from the nearby branches.

So I present to you my closest encounter with the humble Blue Tit, a bird that still gives me immense pleasure to watch and photograph.

Blue Tit

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Blashford Woodland Hide

With weeks of Slimbridge posts I can finally get on to some other wildlife encounters. Unfortunately I am still over a month behind and really should get my fingers loose for plenty of typing.

The following Sunday from my trip to Slimbridge, the girlfriend was down and with some pretty indifferent weather we headed down to Blashford lakes. The main car park was flooded along with the Tern Hide that overlooks the huge expanse of Ibsley Water. That instantly put a massive dent in my visit.

As the rain started to come down we headed for shelter in the Woodland hide. A cracking hide with loads of feeders but only with one partition that opens to allow clean photography. As you can imagine this prime piece of real estate by the window is most usually frequented. And in previous visits as Im sure I've blogged, I have encountered photographers who have bragged about being sat there all day.

Luckily today after 15 minutes or so the old couple that were there up and left, and I was on hand to slide my considerable girth along the wooden bench and into position. As mentioned there are loads of feeders attracting a wide variety of woodland birds. Within minutes, Blue Tits, Great Tits, Coal Tits, Nuthatch, Chaffinch, Goldfinch, Lesser Redpoll, Great spotted Woodpecker, Pheasant, Collared Dove and several stunning male Bramblings had visited the different feeders.

Nuthatch - Check Out The Tongue Action

I try nowadays not to capture birds on the feeders as branches give a far more natural look. This however isn't always easy, especially when the birds tend to land directly on the feeders. I must admit I couldn't resist a few shots of the ever present Nuthatches who were not at all bothered by the camera just a few feet away.

Brambling Male

Goldfinch

The main purpose of my visit was to hopefully catch a few shots of the gorgeous Lesser Redpoll, but after waiting a good hour for them to land on the nearby branches I had to make do with a few feeder shots. The light was changing every 2 or 3 minutes as the clouds rolled by above, which when leaving a clear path for the sun created a lovely glow on the bracken behind the birds.

Now I hear you say I sat in the window a good hour, now that would make me as bad as everyone else I earlier moaned about. But as several other photographers entered and rather annoyingly shot over my shoulders with there lenses, 5 minutes or so later I packed up and let someone else have my spot. Turns out no one filled it so I sat back down. Playing fair isn't it?

Lesser Redpoll

Lesser Redpoll

Cock Chaffinch

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Birthday Blog From Blashford

With the pickings at Langford Lakes pretty slim, we headed back through Salisbury and down towards Ringwood, and the Blashford Lakes Hampshire Wildlife Trust reserve. First port of call the Tern Hide next to the car park overlooking Ibsley Water. If Langford Lakes was scarce, Blashford Lakes proved the exact opposite as I racked up a whopping 8 (all but distant) year ticks! 7 All from the same hide as well, taking my year list to 122.

115 Hobby - 3 circled together in the distance.
116 Little Gull
117 Little ringed Plover - a pair appeared briefly on the top of one of the spits.
118 Common Sandpiper
119 Bar-tailed Godwit
120 Black Tern - 2 adult birds mixing well with the Common Terns
121 Common Tern


The only annoying factor being they were all to far away to photograph, viewing through the scope was a must, Ibsley water stretches out a fair distance, and the islands to which the birds were congregating typically happened to be at the furthest point from the hide.

However several other species where noted and game a whole lot closer, Swallows glided low over top of the waters surface, a Little Grebe floated on the edge of the shore, and even stepped out onto the gravel edge for 10 minutes or so. A sight to behold in itself, its not hard to see why, they're feet are huge and proportioned so far back on they're bodies it must be pretty tricky to walk. 3 Buzzards soared pretty low, along with a few Carrion Crows no doubt in search of the Little ringed Plover or Lapwing youngsters. 4 Whimbrel and a couple of Dunlin in summer plumage joined the Barwits out on one of the tern islands, as plenty of Black headed Gulls congregated with the Terns.

A Lapwing paraded cautiously near the hide which enabled me to get off a few shots, and was soon joined by a Grey Wagtail on the shoreline.

Peg Legged?

Cracking birds in the right light

Lapwing

Grey Wagtail

With the excitement of 7 new sightings in the bag, we headed over to the Woodland hide to see what was feeding, 6 Grey Squirrels, Pheasants, Goldfinchs, Collared Doves, Great Tits & Greenfinchs all visitors to the seed feeders.

Grey Squirrel

We then walked back across to the Goosander Hide overlooking Ibsley water, which is strategically positioned atop of the Sand Martin bank, the activity was pretty frenetic with about 50+ Sand Martins (122) coming and going every 20 seconds or so, some so quick that I had visions of them joining us in the hide. I think I probably fired off about 200 shots on my camera, of birds in flight and when they landeded on the soft moss at the waters edge. They never stay still long enough, so not one was in focus enough to use.

I then most confess to missing what would have been a truly great photographic opportunity, as we rounded a corner on the path out towards the furthest hide, a Fox trotted over top of a grass bank at eye level with a rabbit in its mouth. Seeing us instantly and was gone. To say I was distraught was a bit of an understatement. The remainder of the path had a lot of singing Blackcaps and the odd Reed Bunting flitting back and forth. The only different species viewed from the Hide a lone Shellduck.
The walk back to the car did give me a chance to grab a few shots of a bird that I don't see out in the open very often the Jay.

Jay

All in all a cracking couple of hours and made some good birthday birding. Not a bad way to spend your 26th.

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