The Dark Side

"Your feeble skills are not match for the Power of the Darkside" uttered by Emperor Palpatine to a hapless Luke Skywalker.  Much like the final scene in Return of the Jedi, my camera is also no match for the power of the darkside.  Its good in the Sun but give it some shade and I'm in trouble.  To be more accurate I suspect the lens also plays its part.  Either way I need to stay on the Light side of the Force.

Luckily it was sunny out.  Before I headed out I had to remove a tick from my knee.  Yuck. I did take a picture of it but its so much faff trying to get it from the phone to here I wont bother.

You know what they look like anyway, its a weird spider creature which loves eating you.

I took a stroll through the scenenic route at Ham Wall as the bridge is knackered at the moment.  A Hobby was buzzing about but it was very high up, along with a multitude of Swifts and Martins.

My wanderings brought me along to the Avalon hide, but there was plenty of action beforehand.

A heron was standing nice and still, as I raised my camera for a vertical shot (to fit its reflection in) it suddenly took off and flew straight at me.  Had my camera been in the bog standard horizontal position I would have got some crackers.  Sadly it wasnt to be...

Grrrrrrr.........

To be honest I have know idea what he was up to...

He wasnt alone however.  The white version of him was also in attendance.

Nice to see one a bit closer, and also it seemed a little less bothered by people.

Soon Lee will be selling little bags of herrings at the entrance so you can feed them.

 

 

After the commotion with the heron I moved on.  Here I found a pile of photographers gathered about the place, all trying to get piccies of Woodpeckers.  I joined the crowd, waiting patiently for the noisy little bird to stick its head out.

 

 Sadly the baby had joined the darkside.  

If only he popped his head out on the lightside of the tree!

 

 

After taking about 1000 shots I got bored and went to the Avalon hide.  Marsh harriers were flying about everywhere, always that bit to far away...

 

 

 

 Faraway Marsh harrier

 Lammergeier 

 

After seeing the Lammergeier I decided to exit the hide and head over to the Tor hide.  Even more people were surrounding the woodpecker tree.  Tripods, huge lenses and mobile phones were all clacking, beeping and ringing.

At Waltons there was a family of Canada geese.  Watch out these pictures are very cute.

This little bundle was panicking as he couldnt 

hop over onto the path with his mates!

 

Looking out from the various screens, there was a fair bit going on.  I honestly cant remember where I got all the pictures.  So Ill bung them all together.

 GWE, lots of them about

 Coots scrapping

 1 of 3 Bitterns, sadly not very close.

 Little Grebe in between dives

 Heron looking sleek

 The shoal of Rudd/Roach were to much for this Great Crested Grebe to resit, 

even with me there!

Chaser?! Doing some chasing.

All in all it was a good day and very relaxing to be out amongst nature.  On the way home I quickly stopped at the bridge near to the house.

Darkside dipper swimming about in the stream.

Hopefully next time I will see a Lightside Dipper instead.

Delighted not excited

(CLICK ON A PIC AND IT WILL GO BIG)

Bit of a funny outing today as I was on the old bike and James was wandering with the family in exactly the same places but we never met! We kept each other updated all the same. It was a bit of a funny day with bright light but constant cloud. Only a few break throughs of blue and gold. Still it was a lot better than predicted.

I spent some time at Aqueduct Crossing trying to get the pair of Kingfishers that were obviously feeding young in a nest just by the bridge with no luck whatsoever. I did get a Hobby that was off for lunch at Hamwall though

Hobby

It was definitely a day of the big birds. The Heron family was out in force with both Grey and Great Whites showing well. Time of year I suppose. The two usual suspects were in short supply however with only one brief showing of a distant Bittern at Tor Hide and a distant Marsh Harrier from VP2 as usual

With that in mind I stuck my head down with the new 100mm f2.8 macro. Very nice it is to but the new Youngnou Flash is no where as bright as the old Gyno. I've had to step it all down to 1/250, f18 & ISO200 where I was at 1/320, f22 &ISO100 with the Gyno. I'll sort it out eventually.

With head back to horizontal there was a very nice display of syncronised fishing from a Grey Heron and Great White Egret. Not a pair you usually see tolerating each other so close. Anyway they did exactly the same actions and even darted for prey at the same time. The Heron appeared to get a small stick rather than anything edible and the Egret got erm nothing.

For a change a close-ish Marsh Harrier

From VP2 it was Tor Hide hoping for a Bittern in your face moment as witnessed by Robin Morrison the other day. What are the chances ah!

Cute Coot family

My version of Robin Morrison's pic of that Reed Warbler

Meanwhile Coot Junior was having a feed

A Moorhen in fine fettle

This Heron couldn't have been more obliging

Someone else got to his spot first. He got a bit of a shock

Another junior was in for a good feed

That Reed Warbler again

Parent with the shopping

Gull causing a commotion but passed through

Junior gets a good mouthful

With the air so warm the bugs were high which meant the Hobbys and Swifts were up there with them

Head back down for a bit

I think this is being eaten

Hmm not sure I want to know what these are!

Now that's a good foundation for a nest

The day was getting long as I ended back at VP2. As usual I kept thinking it's been a poor day but really they never are. There is always something and when you get cracking shots of such things as Grey Herons it brings you back to earth as you realise how magnificent they all are. Never loose sight of the common.

Speaking of common there was a final flurry of bog standard stuff with a dual fly-by of a pair of Bitterns and a rather close Marsh Harrier to round of the day.

What a pity there aren't more of the common about like Cuckoos for example. Used to be everywhere but now it's a rare thing. I could hear the two at Hamwall and Shapwick but never saw them. We should be delighted they are back not excited they are back at all!