Wildlife in a Suburban Garden

Another Woodpecker in flight.

I continued my quest to photograph the Crossbills this morning and I will be returning later today for another session, I feel that early evening is going to be more likely.  This morning though, I came really close to success, a large group of the finches were in the tree right above my head and obviously, therefore, also very close to the pool.  I was sure that they were going to come down to drink, I could hear them very noisily calling. Then suddenly, it was quiet and they had moved on again, did they see me, were they disturbed?  I feel sure that it's just a matter of time before they come down predictably to drink.  I am looking forward to this happening not only for me but I also want the opportunity to take along a few bird watching friends.  Crossbills are not that easy to see so it will be a treat for us all.  In the meantime, the Woodpeckers put on a nice show again and I managed to get one of my best in flight shots.  This was the juvenile that seems to be in residence here along with an adult male.   For a photographers perspective, you might find this interesting.  I have come to the conclusion that a minimum of 1/4000 of a second is a must to freeze the wing beat.  To achieve this I set the camera to shutter priority and not the usual aperture priority.  In this way, the camera will constantly change the aperture as the intensity of the light fluctuates. Sometimes the f-stop will be 6.5 and in very bright sunlight might even be 9.5  The shutter speed is the obvious priority and the depth of field comes second.  I choose an ISO that will make it possible to achieve the 1/4000 shutter speed and if the light is really good the depth of field will vary but the "constant" will always the shutter speed that I require.  Here's today's shot.

Crossbills in Haldon Forest

I have been staking out Crossbills in Haldon Forest for the last 5 weeks unfortunately with no photographic success so far.  I scraped out a small drinking pool and lined it with plastic to make the perfect drinking spot for them and have visited regularly since.  Apart from my 5 days in West Yorkshire, I have been most days, sometimes just for a short while admittedly but only once have I seen them drinking from the pool. That was 15 days ago now and in the early evening.  I had gone without my camera on that occasion which is Murphy's law to say the least and I have vowed never to do that again! Crossbills were feeding above the pool very high in the pines and I could see them above me alongside siskin.  Suddenly they came down, mostly individually or in pairs and I counted 26 which was a healthy number.  They were mostly females and youngsters with just 1 or 2 adult males.  It was thrilling to see them and very rewarding that my preparation and planning had paid off. I really thought I had "cracked" it then but that hasn't been the case. It has been frustrating since then because I expected, once they had found the pool that they would come down regularly.  They probably will eventually especially now that we are into a period of dry weather and water might be getting harder to locate elsewhere in the forest.  As I have waited for the Crossbills I have continued to photograph the woodpeckers and I have had some good success with that but even though I have heard Crossbills on most visits, I haven't had any success yet. I will keep trying.

 

Weasel, a brilliant encounter.

I have just returned from a week in Huddersfield West Yorkshire.  I am quite sure that if I lived there I would be able to find some great wildlife to photograph.  August is the worst time of year for birding so I didn't see too much, but enough to whet the appetite.  The highlight was an interaction with a Merlin when, at the same time that I noticed a small group of tits, so did the the raptor.  It swooped in at breakneck speed and I am not sure if it was a successful foray or not, but it was a thrill to see it.  Then, at the RSPB Reserve at Old Moor - near to Rotherham - I saw Tree Sparrow and had my very first glimpse of a Bearded Reedling or Bearded Tit as they are alternitevely known.  This was a massively lucky sighting, 2 pairs bred there this year for the first time so to see one of them was pretty lucky to say the least.  But my best encounter was with two Weasels.  We took the dog for a walk along a very long and not often used track come road towards Deer Hill Reservoir on Marsdon Moor.  There was a large flock of finches feeding on thistles just over the wall and in to a field which was bordered by a typical moorland stone wall. I decided to see if I could photograph them because I knew it would be a good photograph with Goldfinches precarioulsy balancing on the thistles. I ducked behind the wall and waited - my wife  walked on to the car and I said I would follow on in 10 minutes.  After an unsuccessful wait for the finches I stood up and suddenly 2 weasels were moving accross the track like quick silver towards the stone wall, I could clearly see that they were tiny and noticed the russet redness of their coats before they  quickly disappeared in to the brick work. Now I wasnt too disappointed, I had seen them and I doubted that I would get a photograph anyway.  But I froze with my camera at the ready, I had the 500 lens on and also a 1.4 converter but I was hand holding. I have read and been told on numerous ocassions that if you freeze when you see either a stoat or weasel they will quite often return for a look at you.  I made a few sqeeking sounds to imitate a hurt rabbit (hopefully) and then after jsut a few seconds, one of the tiny mustelids pocked its head ot of the grass and peered at me. This was just wonderful and I snapped away.  It seemed like an age before it disappeared again but it was perhaps just a few seconds, long enough for me to take a dozen or so pictures. For some really odd and annoying reason I had the cameras sensitivity set at 2500 ISO.  If you are a pjhotographer you will know how ridiculous that is and surely any pictures would be aweful.  But in this instance this was a big help because it meant that I had achieved 1/5000 of a second and as I was handheld, this is probably the kind of shutter speed that I needed..... a stroke of luck indeed.  The results were nice and I managed photographs of a weasel for the very first time in my life, brilliant!

Haldon Forest

A Roe Buck eating brambles.

 

My pleasure continues at Haldon, although it has been slightly tarnished.  Did you realise,  if you live locally you may be aware but I certainly wasn't, that there is a charge to park?   The Forestry Commission encourages you to use their car park, fair enough I can hear you saying and I would, to an extent certainly agree, that is until I discovered that the exorbitant charge to enjoy this bit of glorious England, this wonderful wild environment that we all own and have a share in is £7 for the day!!!!! Yes, you heard it £7.  Now I have only rarely parked in the carpark because there is only one and it is around a mile from where I want to be.  Haldon Forest is a massive place, if you want to have a chance to see and photograph wildlife then the built up area around the visitor's centre isn't the place to see it. So what are you to do, well park wherever it is safe to do so.  The roads around the park can be quite busy and in the main, car drivers do drive too fast so it's not very easy to find a spot.  I am disabled at the moment, waiting for my knee replacement so it just wouldn't be possible to park in their car park and walk several hundred yards or more to where I want to be.  In addition, being close to the throngs isn't what I enjoy and it totally contradicts why I enjoy taking wildlife photographs in the first place.  OK, so parking where it is safe, and I emphasise that this is important is you would think very straightforward except for this.  Here is a statement from the Forestry Commission website:

Sustaining and maintaining all these developments relies on income generated by our car park. 

 So basically, the car parking charge is an entrance fee. Now, this is all well and good if you want to use all of the facilities that are really just a blight on what used to be a quiet and peaceful place.  There is all manner of things for kids to do and that's fine I suppose and perhaps it's justified that they should pay £7 to swing on a rope or look for the Gruffalo!   There are Mountain Bike trails that scar the landscape and people shout to each other as they race along to keep in contact with their mate in front or behind, even if the distance is 100 yards! In short, I don't want to use any of those facilities and I have long ago stopped objecting to the existence of the buildings that have damaged the environment here, in the UK we are over-populated and people have to go somewhere.  But don't insist that I pay £7 to sit under a tree quietly all day in the hope that a Crossbill comes down to drink!  

The Highway Code is very clear and it states that as long as there are no Bye Laws that state differently and your parking isn't obstructing the Highway then you are perfectly legally entitled to park by the road.  The unfortunate thing is, the Rangers have been briefed by their superiors to harass people in to thinking that they have not got the law on their side.  They want you to park in their car park to contribute to the upkeep of the trails and the slides and all the other paraphernalia. Very sad but that is the situation we find ourselves in. We are being bullied by belligerent, aggressive surly Forestry Commission employees who think very highly of themselves and who swagger around in pseudo "American police shirts" and drive expensive 4x4s.   They have assumed command of the roads there which they have no authority over in their efforts to force you to keep away from the forest unless you pay the £7!!  In the words of Boris "well you can go and whistle".

Even more woodpecker photographs.

These pictures should really be part of the previous post, they were taken on Thursday on my last visit to Haldon.  As you may or may not know, I have been trying very hard to photograph the woodpeckers in flight recently.  It's kind of my thing at the moment and once the obsession passes I will be able to concentrate on something else.  I have been trying to coax the birds to fly in a predictable straight line from the food to the tree and eventually when they do and eventually when it is bright enough,  I will get the perfect photo - it hasn't happened yet but I am getting there and I have the patience to do it.  I think our woodpecker species - all three of them - are beautiful, as nice as any bird anywhere in the world so it's well worth the effort.  The Great - Spotted Woodpecker is something of a star for US birders. It is a very rare visitor there and twitchers are very excited if they get the chance to add it to their USA list.

 I had spent quite a while there and during the late morning the light was from behind me and mostly sunny, I almost got a crisp clear shot as the adult male flew up into the dead tree.  The wing is sharp and in focus but the head for some reason is not!  Quite frustrating but an interesting shot.

 

 

 

Exciting close up with Roe Deer

Roe doe only 10 feet from me, attracted by a Buttolo call.

The  European roe deer (Capreolus capreolus) is now a common species here in the UK.  When I was growing up in the 1950's they were rare and now it always excites me when I see one. Whilst trying to photograph the woodpeckers in Haldon Forest recently, I have regularly encountered them and I decided to make an effort to get some good photographs.  I purchased a Buttolo call which is basically a squeaky toy that imitates the voice of the  Deer.  I had seen this on You Tube and it looked very promising.  When the package  arrived in the post I couldn't wait to try it out.  I was quite optimistic but sceptical to be honest, but I had nothing to lose.  I arrived in the forest yesterday morning and as luck would have it a deer was in the distance feeding amongst the long grass.   It popped its head up and I froze and then managed to tuck myself behind a stout tree.  The doe carried on feeding and with the wind blowing towards me everything was fine.   It was time to use the Buttolo call!  The first squeak made the doe immediately raise its head and stare in my direction but when I repeated it she put her head down and seemed to ignore me, disappointment!  I carried on as per the instructions and what happened next was staggering. Suddenly another doe appeared bounding through the long grass and over the dead branches towards me.  Then very purposefully she continued in my direction.  She kept coming and kept coming until she was literally just 10 feet from me.  She had been attracted to the call which had been imitating a  young fawn, they are left in the long grass by their mothers when they go off to feed.  Being this close to the doe was a lovely encounter.  It made me realise how vulnerable they are and how easy it would be for a poacher to do his worst.  I took some lovely frame filling shots with the camera that literally filled the frame as the doe realised I was there and bounded away to relative safety and disappeared from view.

The doe from a distance looks up when she hears the first squeak.

 

A plan to get the perfect in-flight photo.

I'm still trying to get the perfect photo of a flying Great - spotted Woodpecker.  It wasn't until almost 4 o'clock that the weather improved and it became bright enough to bother but when it did clear up I went back up to the site at nearby Haldon Forest.  As I walked from the car towards the area that I have been baiting with peanuts a woodpecker was there on the remains of the nuts!  I was pleased to see it but I also knew that the bird would be spooked for a while.  I waited for quite a while before any birds returned, both a juvenile and then an adult male. Two birds that I have got to know quite well, they both come regularly whenever I am there. I was particularly excited because I had prepared things really thoroughly and I was hoping that the plan would work well.  I have learnt that the birds like to take peanuts back to the favourite tree in a direct line from the stump. I  loosely tied twine around the tree and led it down to the stump about 30 feet away.  I could then see the height and trajectory of the flight down. Half way along this line I then inserted a stick to the height of the twine and then removed the twine.  I now had a marker at the right height and distance to mark the correct flight path.  Once I was sat behind the camera I could focus accurately on the stick and therefore have the camera set up perfectly so that when the woodpecker flew along this plane it would be in focus.  Now with a woodpecker on the tree, I waited and waited for it to fly down.  When it eventually did, I pressed the shutter on burst mode and hoped that it had passed through the viewfinder. It grabbed a peanut and flew back in the other direction and I pressed the shutter again. For some obscure reason, I didn't capture the flight on the way in but on the way back I was pleased to see that I had achieved success.  believe it or not, even with the shutter speed set to 1/4000 sec it still hadn't frozen the wing movement, and there was some motion blur, woodpeckers obviously fly really quickly.  Today, at last, we have sunlight so I am hoping that later in the morning I will be more successful when I have another try.

PS:  Young Great - spotted Woodpeckers have red on the head and adult males have a red nape but no red on the head.  It will be interesting to observe when the juvenile males start to show the red nape, it is probable that there will be a period when young males have both red heads and a red nape.  

Ramblings about Woodpeckers

The focus for me this last 3 weeks or so has been Great-spotted Woodpeckers, a bird that deserves more attention not only by me but other photographers who don't seem to focus - there is a pun there - on them, either.  Is that because they are hard to photograph? I dont really think so. I have been putting peanuts out on a log and as many as 5 different individulas have visited regularly - who knows, perhaps even more than 5, but at least 2 juveniles together and 2 males, again together and one solitary female. There is a dead isolated tree which is nothing but a 15 foot high trunk riddled with holes made by the birds, it is their "go to" tree.  They come down to the nuts and usually take them back to the tree, stuff them in to one of the pre-drilled holes and then feed on them at their leaisure. This is interesting to see them use the tree to also store food.  On my visit yesterday it was interesting to see one of the juveniles fly on to the stump where previously nuts had been on other days. It seemed really ticked off that there were no nuts there today, it bobbed around excitedly before flying to the stump close to me where the freebies were.  Proving behond doubt that woodpeckers have a memory! The new "table" is going to be a really good opportunity for good photos, yesterday it was a little bit obscurred by foliage which I have now cleared away.  Never the less it was thrilling when the juvenile landed and I took some great photos which filled the frame. The little hide is perfect, it's supported by stout cross poles and then covered with conifer branches from the forest completely covering it looking like a small bush. It's important that it blends in perfectly with the habitat not only for the obvious reason but also because at a casual glance any passing walker will miss it and as it happens, any passing Roe Dear because when I emerged yesterday there about 50 meters was a lovely buck.  It froze and stared in my direction without moving, I did the same and we were in a stand off situation.  I have read that their eyes are good but they percieve things in a different way and detect movement in a much more effective way than humans, as long as you stay still they will usually remain and stare at you trying to work out what you are. Make the slightest movement and off they go.

 

This area is a great habitat for Crossbills and they can be heard regularly throuout the day. high in the conifers.  They have a need to drink regularly and in the past I have been fortunate enough to photograph them low down and on the ground. I have prepared a pool to collect rain water in the hope that I can encourage them to use it and give me a good photo opportunity.