Feeding Station Mark II

In one of last year’s posts I detailed a lot about my hide and feeding station I had set up near the river’s edge. Well throughout the course of the winter with the clocks changing and the variable weather I was really struggling to keep my feeders filled up.

 So I decided over Christmas to relocate all my feeders to the small spinney next to our house. Using the log shed as a hide and setting up shop around an old tree stump and log pile. Being only 60-70 yards from the previous station I was hopeful I would be able to maintain regular feed filling duties without having to put on my wellies and cross a stream and the River. 

I was a little dubious of the new location as the feeders where quite exposed, but very soon I had little at all to worry about as the woodland birds flocked in and have been giving my wallet a bashing buying bird food ever since. 

Relocation now seems a very smart idea as the previous hide is under about 2 feet of water and the new location offers some stunning afternoon light and some much clearer backgrounds. Below are a few shots taken so far.

Backlit Long-tailed Tit

 

Robin

Blue Tit

My Best Long-tailed Tit Shot Ever 

Marsh Tit

 

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Woodland Hide Part 2 - Mid April 2013

Blue Tit 

PART 2
So with my feeding station up and running the next step was to sit back and let the birds flock in. Well maybe that was a bit of an exaggeration but having found a comfortable stool to sit on inside my lean-to hide I was well set. With the fishing season fast approaching on the 1st May and a weeks holiday booked on the 19th April, I had to make sure I could cram in as many visits as possible during the first two weeks of April before having to remove my feeders for the fishing season.

Disaster however struck almost immediately as on the monday morning as I managed an hour in the freezing cold hide at 6.00am. Once settled I turned my Canon 7D on to notice that the memory card wasn't being read by the camera, so I had a fiddle and a blow out of the slot, still nothing. Camera-less I returned home and investigated further, if anyone has a camera with a CF Card slot I would caution you to be so careful when removing and inserting memory cards, I somehow heavy handidly managed to bend one of the central pins resulting in needing a new Card slot and a £168 bill from the Canon recommended repairers! Ouch!!!!!!

But enough about my camera dramas two weeks before holiday, luckily I had the trusty EOS 550D that I keep for shooting landscapes. Big lens attached and I was back in business. The sunshine even decided to show itself for a short while, and as I had a couple of hungry Great Tits visiting my mossy log to feed on the Peanuts and Sunflower hearts hidden in various out of sight crevices. I made full use of the gorgeous orange cast the sun created off of the drying reed and grass by the stream edge in the background.

Great Tit

 

A frequent visitor to the station all throughout the day was the Moorhen, such a skulking species of bird very cautious to come out into the open, and any slight movement or noise and the birds would disappear back into cover. At times 3 individual Moorhens where visiting for dropped seed. I'm guessing the close proximity of the River Test and the stream that runs in front of the hide is a good vessel for arriving and departing quickly.

Moorhen 

As I mentioned in my previous post I couldn't be happier with the amount and diversity of bird species that were visiting my feeders after just a couple of days, the Marsh Tits where a real treat and although not quite as bold as the commoner Blue Tits & Great Tits, they did give some great views. The only problem being the backgrounds in the photographs where a little cluttered. More cropper work needed!

Marsh Tit

As unexpected visitors go I had a few over the course of the week, a Grey Heron on a couple of occasions took quite the liking to my clearing by the river and tried an incoming landing, spotting me sat in my hide at the last second before bailing out. Landing gear trailing as it flew off. A couple of Little Grebe bombed up and down the stream quite regularly often calling a good 50 - 60 yards down stream and within seconds surfacing unexpectedly on the stream right in front of me.

The highlight with out a doubt however was the tell tell call of a Kingfisher followed by the iridescent flash of blue and aqua as it darted by. I live in hope that I might be able to place an attractive perch on the streams edge and get some shots of one our most loved birds. But back to what birds I could actually photograph, having left some seed in the crevices of the log a couple of days later when I next returned to the hide I found that the entire log had almost been stripped of moss. 

I'm not sure if this was the smaller birds looking for nesting materials, work of the Cock Pheasant who had been strutting his stuff around the station or maybe the handy work of the pair of Jays that visit when I haven't been there. I had seen them on most occasions flitting around the edge of the clearing but to cautious to visit when I was in residence.

Robin 

My camera had also found its way back from the repairers so I was quite happy as the thought of not having it for my 'Scottish Holiday' left me feeling quite ill!

After discovering that getting shots of birds on certain perches wasn't as easy as I anticipated I did a little bit of research and come to the conclusion I needed a more attractive appealing food source, so on a lunch break from work I had a trip to Pets at Home and come out with a lot of large meal worms. Live bait!

It's fair to say the new bribe worked and I got some lovely shots of the Long-tailed Tits and Blue Tits that were easily the most frequent and numerous visitors.

Long tailed Tit

Blue Tit

The most unexpected visitors came on my last session in the hide however, having emptied the remains of my meal worms on to the ground beneath the feeders, I had a rather larger bird swoop in from above me, to this day I am even pretty sure it was sat on top of my hide. A female Kestrel dropped in and started feeding on the meal worms. 

Having been a little surprised and having nearly feel off of my stool, I managed to move my lens around and aim towards her on the floor no more that 3 ft away. Knowing that the shutter would most likely give away my position I managed two shots, one to turn her head and the second you see below, before she flew off through the trees with a beak full of mealworms.

Female Kestrel

So having managed some nice shots that I was pleased with in a short couple of weeks, I am really looking forward to setting it all up in the autumn and making full use of 5 or 6 winter months and some hungry birds. Modification ideas are already clogging up my mind and I am hoping to include a reflection type pool of some kind on my table platform too.

Here are all the species I have seen from within my lean-to, I never dreamed I would see so many.

Blue Tit

Great Tit

Long-tailed Tit

Coal Tit

Marsh Tit

Chaffinch

Goldcrest

Chiffchaff

Robin

Great spotted Woodpecker

Jay

Grey Heron

Little Grebe

Moorhen

Treecreeper

Moorhen

Dunnock

Pheasant

Muntjac

Kestrel

Woodpigeon

Kingfisher Blackbird

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Woodland Hide Part 1 - Early April 2013

Long tailed Tit

PART 1

I tend to get many crazy ideas that I think might benefit my photography, usually they are completely unrealistic due to personal and financial limitations. But on this occasion I thought I would give them a go, after getting fed up of unsuccessfully photographing the garden birds that visit the feeding station in the garden, due to the lighting or the lack of natural perches.

So basically I longed for my own 'Outdoor Photo Studio' after seeing a couple of examples of shots that other enthusiasts had gotten from their own D.I.Y 'Feeding Stations' I started to give the idea of my own a lot more thought.

First of all I guess I needed somewhere that was quiet, had plenty of cover for the birds from predators but also had open areas that would allow Hide positioning and the placement of props that allowed a nice clean background behind the subject. With the weather pretty poor that weekend I had a wander around the river looking for possible locations hoping to find somewhere I could place my pop up hide comfortably and fairly concealed.

I know for one, thinking of creating a feeding station at the beginning of April probably wasn't the cleverest forward planning as most of the birds would be finding natural food sources and thinking about breeding, but I had thought at least it would be in position for the autumn. It was whilst pondering this thought that I came across an old lean-to. Put together originally to house the mower for the river bank. 

All over grown and covered in moss and damp, I could instantly see some potential, the mower hadn't been kept in there for a good couple of years rendering the shed pretty much unused. It overlooked a small clear area before the ground reached a stream 25 ft in front. Large conifers to the left and smaller trees to the right. A nice blend of cover and clearing.

STAGE 1 - THE ERECTION

So I had found the perfect shell for my dream D.I.Y woodland hide, so the most important thing I had to sort out prior to getting started was getting Dad to agree to let me remove parts from one of his sheds and clear a largish area right next to the river bank. The bigger bonus was it was only a 2-3 minute walk from the back door.

Surprisingly he agreed fairly easily, so Saturday morning I was stood routing through his van searching for the tools I needed to transform my new found project. Now it is fairly well known that I am not the greatest at D.I.Y or even anything practical that involves common sense, so you can imagine dads face as I loaded a wheel barrow with Saws, Hammers, Fencing poles, Spirit Level, Cordless Drill, Croppers and a Rip Hook. To this day I'm still not sure if it was a look of bewilderment as to if I had any idea what these tools where or as to if he would be taking me to casualty in an hour or so.

What I found

First job was to clear the ground area so I could visualise where I wanted props, feeders and stuff to go, here the Rip Hook came into action and I had soon cleared an area which was covered in dead grass and reed. The croppers where handy in removing plenty of overhanging branches leaving me a couple of good natural hooks to hang feeders from.

Before & After 

My next stage was to remove the old panelling on the side of the Lean-to, re-join together and create myself two hide windows, which I then even to my own surprise managed to fix hinges on to. So windows in place at the right height, I found a rather useful pile of old bridge planks and transformed into a table platform about 3.5 metres from my hide windows. 

These planks also came in quite handy when cut down into matching lengths in positioning over top the muddy earthen floor inside the hide. With hide pretty much complete and feeding table in position, I put up half a dozen feeders around the area to start to drawing in the birds. Sunflower seed hearts, Nyger Seed & Peanuts all dotted around the clearing. 

Having found a nice moss covered tree root nearby I quickly dug it up and positioned it atop of my table platform. Hoping it would be a great stopping point for the birds as they came into the feeders on the pole next to it. A couple of branches from the still green Christmas tree were placed upright in the ground on the other side of the pole feeders completing my initial station set-up.

DIY SOS

All in all nothing to strenuous, all done in a good mornings work. But for someone with my very limited practical D.I.Y skills I was pretty chuffed with how it had all come along and the fact I didn't need to visit casualty.

STAGE 2 - THE BIRDS

Finished I was under no illusion that I would see anything visiting my new feeders for a couple of days, so was fully prepared to wait until the following weekend before spending any time in my new hide. However after having a quick peep the next morning it was clear to see that about 3 of my feeders had taken a little bit of a hammering and the seed levels had dropped by and inch or more.

I am guessing it was due to the unseasonal cold weather, but as a couple of Great Tits swooped in to land on the peanut feeder my mind was made up, to spend a couple of hours in the hide during the afternoon. Still not really expecting to see too much I left the hide exactly 2 hours later froze to the bone but over the moon with what I had seen. 14 Species already!

Blue Tit, Great Tit, Long-tailed Tit, Coal Tit, Marsh Tit, Chaffinch, Robin, Dunnock, Treecreeper, Blackbird, Great spotted Woodpecker, Moorhen, Pheasant & Wren all visited regularly. My most desired species however when initially planning was the Great spotted Woodpecker and the Jay. So to have a female GSW visit within hours of completion I was over the moon.

Coal Tit

As with all of my bright ideas though the conditions for photography couldn't have been much worse, it was freezing cold, far to cold to be sat motionless in a hide for a few hours, and the dull day meant the natural light was pretty poor maximising most of the camera settings.

I did manage a few shots I was happy with as the Long tailed Tits on occasions took fancy to my strategically placed Christmas Tree branch. A Coal Tit was the first bird to find some baited seed on the mossy tree root, and was soon visiting every 2-3 minutes, however being one of the smallest bird table visitors getting the bird to pause long enough for a shot proved tricky. The Robin however was much more obliging pausing long enough for a nice portrait.

Robin

So apart from loosing most of the feeling in my fingers and body due to the cold! I was absolutely over the moon with how quickly the birds had found the new food source. And even more impressed by the amount of species that had already visited.

Now I know not everyone has the luxury of such surroundings and the shell for a hide, but a little bit of hard work can create something that benefits both nature and the photographer. And your D.I.Y skills can't be any worse than mine!

Check back for my next post which will have a lot more shots from the Woodland hide during the first couple weeks of April.

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Snowy Garden Birds - 20th Jan

So if you read my last blog you'll gather that I didn't really have much luck with the whole Garden Birds in the snow scenario, I had dreamt of loads of picture perfect images to adorn the fronts of christmas cards throughout the 2013 festive season, and after fridays dismal showing it was clear that wasn't going to be too easy.

So come Sunday, with plenty of snow still on the ground I thought I would give it another bash, I placed my props, a wooden handle fork - primed with mealworms and seed, and a branch from the now forlorn Christmas tree placed strategically near my feeders.

As you can see from the shots below I had some minor success, 6 Hours spent out in the cold, with some pretty indifferent light, but not one shot did I take of a bird on the props placed!  However less of the studio set up and more about the wildlife.

The Blackbirds and the Robins where the main visitors during the snow storm on friday, and it didn't take them long to appear to feed on the extra grub I had supplied, the Blackbirds particularly enjoying a few apples I had cut up and put out in the hope of drawing down a hungry Fieldfare. Plenty of Fieldfare flew over and even a couple landed in the trees at the bottom of the garden but none brave or hungry enough to venture down for a feed.

Cock Blackbird

Female Blackbird

As the occasional flurry of snow decided to fall, the feeders started to hot up with 6 or 7 ravenous Blue Tits visited on a constant cycle, occasionally joined by 2 or 3 bullying Great Tits. This as always causes the smaller birds to scatter and there I was primed finger on shutter ready for a shot on my spruce! Not to be although I do quite like a few shots I got of a patiently waiting Blue Tit sat on some of mothers garden trellis.

Blue Tit

The smallest of the visitors was the Marsh Tit, they seem to adopt the grab and run technique, getting some seed before zooming off into the trees with their morsel, this made photographing them pretty tricky, luckily one had to wait its turn on the feeder so paused momentarily on the frame of the dog kennel.

Marsh Tit

If ever a garden bird arrived Mob handed its the Long-tailed Tit, one appears then within seconds the feeders are teeming with 7-8 noisy birds. I would say they were probably the most numerous and frequent visitor, and a little more willing to pause for pictures, again none landing on the props.

Long-tailed Tit

So the main purpose of my photography session in the garden was to try and get some nice natural looking wintery Robin pictures, I finally managed to get the conditions I wanted just no willing subjects, well not on a natural perch anyways.

Robin

With all the action going on above on the feeders, it was pretty inevitable that some birds would be benefitting from the falling seed, the Pied Wagtail is an occasional visitor to the garden, but on this occasion present all day long zooming in to grab a few morsels before vanishing then re appearing 2 or 3 minutes later. The local Chaffinches also used this ploy although they didn't stick around long enough for a photo.

Pied Wagtail

Spending that much time in the garden you tend to pay attention to everything flying by, flying over or passing through. Jay, Woodpigeon, Buzzard, Red Kite, Kestrel, Pheasant, Grey Wagtail, Kingfisher & Little Egret all seen at some point during the day from the garden seat.

So not a completely dead loss, Im quite happy with a few shots considering the light was pretty poor for the entire weekend. 

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Garden Light Not Quite A Delight

With no plans for the day, a few Sundays back I decided I'd try and spend some time with the garden birds, in-between a lot of periods of helping Dad with the odd job or too at home. A nice day beckoned and although the grass was crisp with an early morning frost, a lot of mist hung in the air. Thats one of the smaller issues I have with living next to a river, waiting for it to clear off was a pain.

Having setup a landing branch just feet from the feeders, I was already attracting plenty of visitors, however the combination of shade from the willow tree at the bottom of the garden caused by the lowly and slowly rising sun and the mist that hung still in the air, made for some pretty high ISO's and some rather grainy early shots.

First to inspect the branch was a Robin, several appeared before me throughout the morning, one second they're perched nicely posing, the next off in a blur of feather after the intruder. Blue Tits, Great Tits & Coal Tits visited frequently and fast. Barely pausing to grab a seed before they were off back into the surrounding woodland, the one species that did takes its time and one of my favourite garden visitors, the Marsh Tit, we seem to have a healthy population in the garden with up to 4 birds visiting at anyone time.

Cock Robin

Marsh Tit

Collared Dove

The clear up specialist arrived roughly about once an hour to pick up the fallen seed, the Collared Dove always seem to know what time to visit, making sure there would be enough to feed on. As the day progressed and the sun moved somewhat higher and further around in the sky, the lighting on the feeding station changed from dull to bright in the mere matter of minutes, from ridiculously high ISO's because of the dull light, I then had to wrestle the camera settings to knockout all of the highlights. Never satisfied! The brightness did however create a nice bokeh effect in the background.

Other visitors included Nuthatch, Goldfinch, Chaffinch & Long Tailed Tits who I shall post about next, plenty of variety and quite an enjoyable few hours spent at home with the camera.

Great Tit Bokeh

Great Tit

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