Whilst Storm Clodagh blew through on Sunday, the best location in my mind was to be inside, and the bird hides at Blashford Lakes beckoned. With the adverse weather the light was low and so a higher than normal ISO was required to get a shootable speed. After the tern hide, and Ibsley hides provided nothing close by in relating to wildlife, a short visit to the Woodland hide provided
This cheeky Robin was a difficult subject to capture on camera today at Blashford Lakes Nature Reserve, but not for the normal reason, it kept hoping towards me and getting too close to the lens to take. However a bit of perseverance by me, in backing off from it I got a couple of close up images of the bird. Having recently purchased Topaz Texture Effects, I decided to have
Early September is a fairly quiet time for photographing birds, as many of the migrants have left, and we await the winter migrants arrival. Still it was worth a venture out to Blashford Lakes again, though I did not see the reported Little Stint or Osprey, these three all year round residents of the reserve were worth watching and photographing. First a Great Crested Grebe. And from the same hide,
When birds come close to the front of the Tern Hide at Blashford Lakes, then nice large images can be taken of the them. This was the case today as a Lapwing patrolled the gravel outside of the hide. The wind blowing its head feathers into a punk like appearance. Also close to the shore was a Little Grebe – swimming along next to the gravel.
Summer is a time of colour for birds – with the adults in their breeding plummage – and the youngsters adding to is as they start to fledge. Perhaps one of the more startling transformations that is viewable in the UK is that of the Turnstone. From a drab white and brown winter birds – the adult breeding plumage is a bright orange. I was lucky enough to see one
On a post Christmas visit to Blashford Lakes, to try out a Pro Viewfinder Loupe ( a loupe that fits on the LCD screen on Canon Cameras that enables easier videoing, as it acts as an eyepeice ), I was fortunate to see a very beautiful kingfisher. Not only was the kingfisher fairly close to the Ivy North Hide window, but it stayed around for a fair while, enabling me to shoot some photos of the bird, as well as video it.
The Loupe worked very well and I was able to use my Canon with a 300mm F4 Lens, plus 1.4 x Convertor much easier in video mode, as I could hold it up to my eye to video & not have to have it at arms lengths.
Here are a couple of photos of said Kingfisher.
