It's been a while since I've posted on here...about six months!, for no good reason apart from a large dose of lethargy on my part. So, I thought I'd better make the effort and start off the new year with a selection of images taken over the last month. We've had a few crisp, bright and frosty days over the last few weeks and most of the local water bodies have had large amounts of ice on them, concentrating the wildfowl into smaller areas than normal...making life a little easier for the photographer...!
Gadwall taking flight...
Tufted Duck fly over...
A pretty in pink Mr. Wigeon...
There's quiet a few Goosander being reported in the area at the moment...
Still finding it difficult getting the contrast right between the iridescent green head and the subtle salmon pink tinged body of the male!
Plenty of 'winter' thrushes about at the moment too...
Fieldfare
Redwing
A male Reed Bunting...
And in plain view, instead of using it's camouflage to 'hide' in the undergrowth, a fly over Snipe...
And my 'bestest' little birds of the year..so far!..a very showy pair of Stonechats...
Earlier this week saw me back up to Milton Keynes and another visit and walk around Caldecotte Lake (the ‘boss’ is still away!). The water was almost back down to it’s normal level although the river was still very full and fast flowing. The bird life seemed to be very sparse up at the normal gathering point on the arm behind the pub, the large flock of Wigeon that are usually there were gone, which left just a few Tufted Ducks, two drake Pochard, three Great Crested Grebe, quite a few squabbling Coot and an elusive female Goosander and that was about it. Further round and the dam wall was covered from end to end with Black-headed Gulls with the odd Common Gull mixing in. The rest of the main lake seemed to be devoid of any birds at all, save for a couple of Mute Swans ‘upending’ close to the bank. And then I saw the reason why there were so few birds…in the distance coming from under the road bridge, side by side and, causing a large wake were two boats..a speedboat and the RIB from the yacht club! Not much hope of seeing any birds today then?
As I continued on around a large flock of Graylag Geese came flying noisily in from the meadow by the river where I’d seen them grazing earlier. I managed to ‘catch’ these two.
Further on around, in the quieter waters by the houses and the bandstand, I spotted a male Goosander. Taking cover behind a tree I was able to get reasonably close, and for once it hadn’t spotted me. I spent a good half an hour taking photos but with the contrast between the Goosanders dark head and white body I was having difficulty with setting the correct exposure on the camera, either getting blocked in darks or blown highlights!
Here’s two of my best efforts…
I almost got the green sheen on it’s head in this one!!
Moving on and my attention was drawn to a funny sounding cooing noise coming from the branches above me, almost like a cooing Wood Pigeon but not as clear or as loud, scanning the branches I soon located the culprit…it wasn’t a Wood Pigeon, but a Carrion Crow attempting a very good impression of one. I tried to get some video but as soon as I got the camera to focus through the branches it flew off, it’s always the way!! Further on and I met a little old lady out walking her dog ‘have you seen the Heron’ she said ..‘no none yet today’ I replied… ‘there’s one there’ she said pointing to a juvenile Heron on the far side of the water and then we both heard a sound…’Woodpecker’ she said…and that’s what it sounded like to me a bit weak but definitely a drumming Woodpecker. Scanning through the branches and no Woodpecker to be found, and then the drumming sound again…almost above our heads this time, an there doing it’s best to be a Woodpecker was…yep!…a Carrion Crow, the same one that was earlier being a Wood Pigeon! The little old lady went off shaking her head and saying ‘ my husband won’t believe me when I tell him about this’. I’m not sure I believed it either, I knew that Crows were intelligent birds but I didn’t know they went in for mimicry?
Not much to report from the rest of my walk around the lake, a dozen or so Cormorants loafing in the trees on the island and a small raft of gulls out in the middle of the south lake and the odd Mallard and Tufted ducks. And Keith’s ‘pet’ Robin came zooming in for some food, even before I’d got the bag of seed out of my pocket! And to finish, showing well in the sunshine, a Carrion Crow…no, not ‘the’ Carrion Crow!
Earlier this week I had occasion to visit Milton Keynes and, as Keith is away sunning(?) himself half way up a Welsh mountain at the moment, I decided to have a quick look to see how ‘his birds’ around Caldecotte Lake were fairing during his absence! I only had a short time so was only able to have a look at the ‘arm behind the pub’. The lake is now back to it’s normal level after the recent flooding but surprisingly there wasn’t many birds around…perhaps Keith has taken them all away with him?…a few Wigeon and Tufted Ducks, a few Coot and a couple of Mute Swans and in the distance three Grey Herons were having a bit of a set too, with quite a bit of squawking and chasing around going on, watching through the bino’s it appeared to be an adult bird giving grief to a couple of juveniles…time for them to be on their way, I guess? A pair of Great Crested Grebe appeared not too far away doing some ‘head wagging’ unfortunately they didn’t get into the full ‘weed dance’ routine and seemed to lose interest after a while and drifted away.
I then spotted, close into the far bank, a male and two female Goosanders. I slowly moved down to the waters edge and tried to hide behind a small group of bushes in the hope that they would swim out into more open water. Eventually one of the females ventured a little closer.
I don’t know what spooked them, perhaps they spotted me?…but all of a sudden they were up and away.
There were lots of Black-Headed Gulls, some just cruising around….
…and others just loafing on the water.
A good many of them have started to acquire their brown head covering now.
In amongst the Black-Headed Gulls I spotted a couple of 1st. winter Common Gulls and as they flew around I noticed that they both had leg rings, I spent quite a few minutes attempting to get some images of them, I eventually, after almost melting the shutter on the camera!!, got some images where I could read the numbers on the rings. This one has a white ring on it’s right leg with 17EB on it, it also has a metal ring on it’s left leg.
This one has a green ring on it’s right leg with JO59 on it, it also has a metal ring on it’s other leg.
The same bird…resting!
The next day I sent off the ring details to the Euring ring recovery service, the following morning I received an email from a Mr. Morten Helberg in Norway telling me that ‘JO59’ had been rung, presumably as a chick, at Tveitevannet Lake in Bergen Norway on 19th. August 2013 which is 1001Km (622 miles) from Caldecotte Lake although, apart from a few sightings as it travelled south through Norway, we don’t know where it’s been or how far it’s travelled in the interim. It’s always interesting to get information on how far, and where, a particular bird has traveled from and to and also to know that, now my sighting has been logged, I’ll always be a small part of that bird’s history. I’m still waiting on any info/news of the travels of ‘17EB’…I’ll keep you informed if I hear anything.
Carrying
on from the previous post this is the second in a series of three posts (not
many words of wisdom just a selection of images that I hope you will enjoy)
each one dedicated to a different location that I've had the pleasure of
visiting since the beginning of the month.
I have
visited Caldecotte Lake in Milton Keynes Buckinghamshire on a few occasions
since the beginning of the month and in varying weather conditions, ranging from
snow lying on the ground with the lakes almost frozen over, to a cold overcast
day with a blustery wind blowing, through to a sunny day with a bright blue sky.
But, no
matter what the weather, the wildlife around the lakes never fails to throw up
a good photo opportunity or two.
The
photos...
One of the ever present Mute Swans patrolling his patch
And the 'stars' that have taken up residence, sometimes in quite large numbers, over the last month....
Goosanders
Male
Female
Carrion Crow...on the lookout for apple cores, maybe?
A Male Pochard
Cormorant in breeding plumage...the white thigh patch is 'flashed' during the courtship display!
On the day when there was snow on the ground and everything was frozen solid I spotted a group of Long-Tailed Tits busily flitting through the branches of some recently felled trees and I noticed that this one was going from branch to branch drinking from the icicles that had formed on the ends.....unfortunately not a very good photograph as I was shooting into the light!!
Dunnock
Reed Bunting...a male, almost into his black faced breeding plumage.
And if your quick enough there's always a chance of a flight shot...
Greylag Goose
Black Headed Gull
Grey Heron
For those
of you who have yet to 'see the light!' pop over to CaldecotteLake where you
can accompany Keith as he gives you a daily tour around the lake with the help
of his excellent photos and videos.
Last MondayKeithand I had a day out toPitsford Water in
Northamptonshire. We arrived at around 6.30am, and after buying our permits ( excellent
value at £5) from the little hut by the main gate we parked up on the causeway
that divides the reservoir into two parts (wildlife reserve and sailing). By
now the sky was beginning to show the first glimmer of light and the first
thing that we noticed, apart from the cold ( -4 C / 25F ), was how low the water level
was, which doesn't bode well for the Summer.
Whilst having a warming cup of coffee and waiting for the
sun to rise we noticed stream after stream of Gulls coming in to land on the
water from where they had, presumably, roosted for the night. Over the din of
the traffic which was now getting busy along the road, we started to hear from
across the water, what we decided were
Jackdaws 'talking' to each other prior to leaving their roost and sure enough,
as the chattering got louder literally hundreds of Jackdaws left the trees and
started swirling around in the sky before slowly dispersing to wherever they
were going to spend their day - a beautiful sight!
After recording at least 17 different bird species without
moving away from the car and watching a beautiful red sunrise it was time to
set off on our seven mile trip around the reserve and within less than 300
yards we came to a small group of bushes containing a feeding station where,
amongst others, we found large flocks of
Fieldfare, Tree Sparrows and Yellowhammers. Keith also spotted a covey
of Red-legged Partridge making a hasty retreat!
With another ten or so species
recorded here it looked like a good day was in store. Unfortunately
the birds were keeping their distance making it difficult to get any
real close photo opportunities.
Fieldfare
Retreating Red-legged Partridge.
So, on with our walk, despite the sun now shinning in a
bright blue sky it was still cold with a thick white frost on the ground. Although
there are numerous hides overlooking the water we didn't see any waders mainly
due to the shallow water in the scrapes being frozen over!
For most of the way
the path tends to be some distance from the water's edge and travels through
various stands of trees, quite a few species noted here including both Green
and Great Spotted Woodpecker, Jay, Pheasant, and Bullfinch. We were also
accompanied for most of the way by what appeared to be a single Robin darting
from bush to bush just a few yards in front of us but in reality it was a 'relay' of
Robins escorting us safely through their 'patch'.
There were still a few Jackdaws hanging around.
Nearing the end of our walk the path again afforded good
views across the water where we had a good, if fleeting, view of a pair of Goosander and a male Goldeneye.
Goosanders
I also managed to capture this image of a different kind of
aviation. There is a small airfield close by Pitsford called Sywell were they
fly a lot of vintage aircraft. I checked the registration number and this is
a DeHavilland DH-82A Tiger Moth built in 1939. I don't know what the
passenger jet is but it just struck me as to how far (in some ways!!) we have
advanced over the last 70 odd years!
So after seven miles and a little over six hours of pleasant
walking we arrived back at the car for a welcome 'picnic' of rolls and coffee.
With over fifty species of birds logged along with Rabbits, Brown Hares and
Grey Squirrels it turned out to be a very enjoyable day.
