British Wildlife Calendar 2017

Looking at the time of year I thought it was about now that I should bring back the blog. It's been brought back quite a few times and will probably be brought back again in the future as finding time to write is always so hard.

So anyways some new content. Well looking under the bed in the spare room this morning I realized I still had a handful of my 2017 Calendars in stock. When I say a handful I mean under 10 so here is a short write up featuring this years shots.

If anyone has started their Christmas shopping already and needs a small stocking filler, these are great little gifts. And a bargain at £7.00. Local Delivery/Collection is Free. Or I can post for a £1.00

More information or to order you can visit my websites 'Online Shop' here: British Wildlife 2017 Calendar

As always my Calendar features shots of totally wild British birds and mammals photographed throughout the past year. I always try my best to include an even mix or birds and mammals if I can relate them to the month in which the photo was taken. Here is this years selection.

January 2017 - Great spotted Woodpecker - Taken from my pop up hide around my garden feeders.

February 2017 - Brown Hare - Frosty winter mornings were perfect for catching up with the local Brown Hares.

March 2017 - Great crested Grebes - An early spring trip to the Somerset levels brought a morning with a Great crested Grebe pair on a small lake.

April 2017 - Yellowhammer - My local population were looking stunning as they came into breeding plumage.

May 2017 - Eurasian Otter - A close encounter of the Otter kind whilst holidaying on Mull.

June 2017 - Atlantic Puffin - Some Puffin therapy from a couple of hours spent on the Isle of Lunga.

July 2017 - Roe Deer - With Summer underway, the freshly harvested fields became battlefields for the annual Roe Deer rut.

August 2017 - Kingfisher - 4 Years living by a river and finally I manage a Kingfisher shot.

September 2017 - Red Kite - You never know what species will turn up in the garden when the camera is out, this Kite landing in a tree was a little bit of a shock.

October 2017 - Reeves' Muntjac - Alert as ever, my closest encounter to date with the Muntjac.

November 2017 - Wigeon - I have never had the pleasure of photographing these magnificent ducks up close until a chance visit to RSPB Greylake.

December 2017 - Short-eared Owl - No year would be complete without a shot of these awesome Owls, taken around midday on a grey December day.

As mentioned above for more information or to order you can visit my websites 'Online Shop' here: British Wildlife 2017 Calendar

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Caring For Kestrels - September 2015

The blog is back, but for how long who knows, but this time I am going to try make a conscious effort to post regularly.

This year’s autumn week away only stretch as far as a few days down to the Somerset levels, what with a new job and new house planning holidays had been the last thing on my mind. However it gave a great opportunity to explore the Avalon Marshes nature reserves of Ham Wall, Shapwick Heath and Westhay Moor.

After a morning exploring Steart Marshes we headed over to Westhay Moor a site I hadn’t been to before. Donna and I spotted a couple of big lens bods further down the path from the car park so we headed off that way. A passer-by informing us of a very bold Kestrel that was obviously their targeted subject.

We soon spotted the bird perched among the autumn leaves of a row of silver birch, camouflaged well against the greens and oranges of the changing leaves. It kept peering down, seemingly not too bothered by the few spectators clicking away.

A group of kids and their mothers passed, screaming and running amok flushing the bird up for a couple of minutes, it did a couple of circle flight and then came straight back in and landed in the branches 20ft above our heads. I’ve not seen a wild Kestrel this close before and was quite surprised by how fearless it was.

It looked quite ragged in flight so I did wonder if it wasn’t too well, but it was soon catching Dragonflys that were basking on the path and hunting for earth worms among the mole hills.

Having almost filled the memory card up with Kestrel shots we walked off around the rest of the reserve, missing the resident Bearded Tits by seconds. Kingfishers called and zoomed along all the channels. After a couple of hours covering the wide expanse of Westhay and taking in the several different hides overlooking the reed beds, we ticked of Great White Egret on the furthest walk and as we headed back to the car in the gloom, the Kestrel appeared again in front of us.

The way it perched on the branch it just didn’t look healthy, the wing drooped a little but still it kept dropping down to catch earth worms. We crawled ever closer taking yet more pics in the awful light accommodated all the time by the bird.

It then flew up and did a short circle flight before dropping down in the bracken, emerging a few seconds later with a mouse. So it looked ill but somehow seemed to catch more prey in the time we were watching it than should be natural. I still couldn’t make up my mind.

We had to walk on a bit more and as we got a little closer the Kestrel was up and off further down the path with its catch, out into a more open area with some slightly better light. Just as it got out into the open it dropped its prey and having found a new vantage point knelt down just metres away it came trotting back through the grass in search of it.

Finally reunited with its lunch my final Kestrel shot was of the bird feeding atop one of the hides. A close encounter never to forget and one that by the end of our visit to Westhay had convinced us that there wasn’t too much wrong with this bird. All we could put it down to was that perhaps it had been injured before and raised back to health with a human imprint on it.

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Little Grebes - End Of March 2013

A project I have been looking to get cracking with for sometime was working with the Little Grebes on the river near the house, last summer and throughout the winter there has been quite a healthy population with pairs every 300-400 metre stretch along the bank. However a problem I have encountered in the past is that they seem to be easily the most spooked bird I have ever come across.

I've tried camouflage unsuccessfully, and on several times walking tight to the edge of the woodland to approach birds I could see on the water, and every time I seem to have been spotted a good 60-100 yards before I got anywhere near level with the bird, I recall hearing that tell tale plop as the bird disapeers under the water and heads for the shadowy safety of the bankside reed.

So finally on Easter Sunday I found some time to dedicate to a pair of Grebe that were starting to defend their territory. On a nice wide stretch of the River Test, it was a relatively bright morning and as I slowly made my way up the bank to a spot where the local Mute Swans haul themselves up out of the water on to the bank, here the foliage on the water edge was flattened nicely allowing me to rest my camera and beanbag in the small gap.

With the amount of rain which had fallen over the winter, water levels in the Test where at quite a high which was quite convenient for creating a very shallow depth of field due to the low angle of my positioning and the high water level. Having seen the Grebes at this spot quite a few times without managing any photographs, I was quite happy to see them further upstream at a safe enough distance not to disturb. So I led down on the bank and waited, letting the spring growth of the reed hide my form from the water.

45 minutes on and off of listening to the distinctive Grebe shrilling call let me know that the birds where starting to come a little closer, eventually coming into view on the reed edge of the far bank. I had set my camera to Low Speed Continuous shooting in a ploy to avoid spooking the birds with the machine gun chatter of my shutter going off.

Eventually one off the birds drifted out mid stream allowing me my first real close up view of this waterborne skulker, the red plumage on the back of its head glowing in the bright morning sunshine.
I tried to keep my lens movement to a minimum to avoid spooking the bird, and it seemed to work well as one bird was soon joined by its partner.

I was really happy with my 2 hour session on the river bank, and even the annoyance felt as a Kingfisher landed on a over hanging branch 20 yards downstream didn't distract me and my time with the Little Grebes. Plans where made at the time to visit them again when the green colouring of the spring foliage was present, and to this day I still haven't managed to wangle the time to visit them again. Although I am hoping now that they have bred successfully and have a small stripy brood following in their wake.

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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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Boxing Day Little Grebes

With the weather dismal over Christmas, any opportunity where there was a break in the clouds on Boxing Day morning, I was out of the house, covered from head to toe in waterproof clothing and perched on the River Bank camera in hand.

After a brief glimpse of the Kingfisher fleeing downstream, I waited for the arrival of the Little Grebe, there is quite a healthy population at the moment with a pair seemingly every 200-300 yards along the river. They are a species that I can never seem to get to see close up. Walking the banks if you spot one 100 yards away they always seem to have spotted you first and are down under the water and away to skulk unseen at the waters edge.

However I was in position for them this time, concealed against the footbridge and a nearby Willow, it wasn't long before a pair had drifted down within camera range. Movements were reduced to a very slow minimum in an attempt not to spook them, and it worked this time. My closest photos to date, just a shame about the poor lighting conditions.

As a few spots of rain started to fall, I thought I better head back through the flooded water meadow at risk of getting drenched. I flushed a single Snipe, my first on the new patch but hopefully a good indication of more to come. And luckily I got back just in time, before the rain fell again.

Little Grebe

Little Grebe

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BBOWT Bird Race - 2nd Dec

My sister since the summer has been working/intern for the Berks, Bucks and Oxon Wildlife Trust, and on the 2nd of December they held there annual Bird Race. Now this was something new for me and I promptly said I would be up for it. We met under the shadow of Didcot power station just south of Oxford. 

And although the initial plan for each team was to be captained by a BBOWT Employee, kind of like your birding pro. Our team however didn't have one and we were all complete newbies to the race.

With rules explained (a visit to 3 BBOWT reserves compulsory  and teams decided we were partnered with my sisters fellow intern and his friend (one a policeman an one an ex policeman). Local enthusiasts who knew the area fairly well. So happy to try our best we set off at our own pace, finding several birds on route before stopping just down the road at Odey Hill, a small untouched, unnoticed area of public ground on the outskirts of Didcot that happened to be flooded and have a large area of reed/scrub. This proved to be a little hidden gem as we raced to 30 species. I spotted a Kingfisher flashing by but the rules stated that all team members had to have seen or heard and I was the only one so a little gutted we all were.

The local lads Mark and Nick soon had a plan though, determined not to miss the Kingfisher from our list we headed into the centre of Abingdon, both keen fishermen they assured us that it was a good a spot as any to see  a Kingfisher on the very swollen River Thames. A brief chat with the local fishermen seemed like we had missed out by 2 minutes, but 10 minutes or so later that familiar call caught our attention and we all got a glimpse before it flew off upstream. Local knowledge is still the best I reckon.

From Abingdon we headed to Radley Lakes another untouched gem where we added several different duck species and a rather surprising Blackcap. Well spotted by Mark as he drove us down the single track lane.

With the list starting to resemble something respectable we decided to get the BBOWT reserves ticked off of the list. With visits too Dry Sandford Pit, Parsonage Moor & Lashford Lane Fen - 3 reserves all within 2 miles of one another. Unfortunately neither of these reserves brought anything new to the list, and after making the drive out too Farmoor Reservoir we were a little disappointed to run into another team who had seen a Hawfinch at  Dry Sandford about 20mins prior to us.

Determined not to let that get us down we had a wander around the large expanse of the Farmoor Reservoir, a quite unattractive man made water source, but very good for birds, highlights that included my first ever Slavonian Grebe & a couple of female Scaup.

With the species list getting harder and harder to lengthen we headed off to the nearby Dix Pits which had been mentioned in the morning briefing as a good spot for wintering waterfowl. This proved true with Red-crested Pochard and Pintail added to the list once spotted amongst the throng of hundreds of waterfowl, the adjoining rubbish dump gave a few gull species to the list too.

As time ticked on and the light started to fade a pit stop at Chimney Meadows another BBOWT reserve in the hope of picking up Tree Sparrow failed miserably as none appeared in the gloom at the feeding station. As we headed back to base, we were all pretty happy with our 63 Species for the day as well as our low mileage of just 55.1 miles.

Once all the teams where back lists were discussed, birds seen and missed discussed, we established that out of 8 teams we finished 5th quite respectable I think as we had no guidance and where all bird race virgins. The winners finished with 76 after a successful venture to the distant RSPB Otmoor reserve. 

All in all a thoroughly enjoyable day in landlocked Oxfordshire, and something I would definitely do again next year, from a photographic perspective opportunity's where a bit few and far between due to the nature and rushed aspect of the day.

Species Seen

Sutton Courtney BBOWT Centre

1. Woodpigeon • 2. Blackbird • 3. Redwing • 4. Carrion Crow • 5. Chaffinch • 6. Moorhen

On Route

7. Red Kite • 8. Collared Dove • 9. Magpie • 10. Feral Pigeon • 11. Fieldfare • 12. Great spotted Woodpecker

Odey Hill

13. Starling • 14. Mallard • 15. Grey Heron • 16. Coot • 17.Teal • 18. Blue Tit • 19. Goldfinch • 20. Gadwall • 21. Tufted Duck • 22. Snipe • 23. Wren • 24. Robin • 25. Dunnock • 26. Reed Bunting • 27. Kestrel • 28. Pied Wagtail • 29. Black headed Gull • 30. Mute Swan

On Route

31. Rook • 32. Pheasant

Abingdon

33. Canada Goose • 34. House Sparrow • 35. Kingfisher

Radley Lakes

36. French Partridge • 37. Jackdaw • 38. Cormorant • 39. Blackcap • 40. Pochard • 41. Great crested Grebe • 42. Little Grebe • 43. Herring Gull • 44. Long tailed Tit • 45. Buzzard

Boars Hill

46. Green Woodpecker • 47. Jay

Farmoor Reservoir

48. Greylag Goose • 49. Greenfinch • 50. Goldeneye • 51. Grey Wagtail • 52. Slavonian Grebe • 53. Scaup • 54. Sparrowhawk • 55. Meadow Pipit

Dix Pit

56. Wigeon • 57. Greater Black Backed Gull • 58. Lesser Black Backed Gull • 59. Common Gull • 60. Red Crested Pochard • 61. Song Thrush • 62. Pintail

The only shot I really managed to take.

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Roving Redstart

As the nights start to close in with increasing speed, time spent out after work with the camera is starting to be a bit of a juggling act, an hour and a half of good light seems to be about all that was on offer the first week in September. Finally some Wildlife showing up again now though, I caught up with a Roe Doe and her two Fawns one evening as the sun had just gone down, the first deer I've seen on the water meadows in about 2 months. A welcomed sight.

Roe Doe

Roe Doe & Fawn

The next night I did have a pleasant surprise, forced to walk through the cows out in the water meadows due to Fishermen on the river, I came across a new patch tick, and a complete new species for me, one that I had been hoping to catch up with for a little while. A Redstart, a juvenile male, but a Redstart none the less. I picked it up on the thistles around the cattle troughs and was quite startled as this gorgeous red plumaged bird disappeared off across the field in front of me. luckily it stopped on the gate posts to one of the Fishing huts, and proceeded to feed and flit about giving me great views at about 40 yards. What a bird, I must admit nothing could wipe the smile off my face for the rest of the evening.

Redstart

Redstart

Redstart

Redstart

Redstart

Still high on my first new species for a longtime, I had a wander around the Half Water the stretch of river on the other side of the water meadows, a tributary of the River Test and fisherman free for the day. Plenty of birds here, with Great Tit, Blue Tit & lots of Long Tailed Tits frequenting the branches above the water. Little Grebe could be heard further downstream and still escape my lens on every trip, there awareness is by far the best I've ever encountered in a bird. I did see 2 Kingfishers and hear another but both moved so fast a picture was near on impossible. Leaving me to look back across the meadows as the suns got lower and lower, backlighting the below shot of a Cow quite nicely.

Backlit Cow

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Langford (Grebe) Lakes

With the day off work on monday and the weekends floods subsiding long enough to contemplate going out for the day, Nat and I headed off down the A303 to Langford Lakes to see what was about. The answer to that question was pretty evident straight away - Not alot!

Tufted Ducks and Canada Geese seemed the only birds to grace the water throughout the reserve, with even the usual Coots and Mallard fairly scarce.

Tufted Drake

Angel Wings? Canada Goose

2 Bird species however didn't appear to be lacking in numbers, I counted 17 Chiffchaffs in the time we spent at Langford, and I did manage to get a fairly decent photography of a singing Chiffchaff from the window of one of the hides.

Singing Chiffchaff

The other was Great-crested Grebe - on the 3 lakes they're were 12 birds, 9 Adults and 3 youngsters - definitely 4 pairs. 1 Pair still sat on a nest and another with 3 hungry youngsters. I don't remember ever seeing so many. Whilst watching the singleton Grebe from the camouflage of the hide, a Kingfisher landed on the branches a mere 10 ft from the windows, a blessing usually, but in this instance a nightmare as no matter how many times he returned to many branches obstructed a picture.

The Grebe chick (Out of Shot) proceeded to wolf down this fish whole!

Still on the nest.

Grebe family.

The singleton.

Not the most thrilling of days but shouldn't complain to much - I thought I'd share this pic I took on friday morning, before the rain returned down at Rooksbury.

"There is nothing, absolutely nothing so much worth doing as messing
around in boats." - Ratty (Wind in the Willows) this little chap might
need a boat if it keeps on raining.

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