Steppe Grey Shrike

At last I had some time and a reasonable weather window to get up to photograph this bird.
More on my Flickr gallery too! http://www.flickr.com/photos/nigelblake/

More bleedin' fish

I shall upload more images of the Green Heron at West Hythe when they are processed, there's rather a lot!

Autumn

Autumn is my favourite time of the year, loads of colour and subjects to photograph; it's just a shame the daylight hours are shorter so there's less time to shoot it all!
The Shaggy Ink cap fungus below was photographed just up the road from my home, you really don't need to travel very far to find good subjects!

More from Scotland

A few more images from the trip to Scotland, I shall add some more as I work my way through them all.

Small birds with big personalities

I've just returned from a very productive trip to Scotland, over 2000 images to edit, these are a few of the first off the memory cards.
The Wrens and Goldcrests at the place where I stayed were just the most confiding birds I have ever photographed, the weather was a little less friendly at times, but it did make for some interesting landscape shots.
More on my flickr gallery, see link on the right of this page.
New web site is almost there (I've had such a busy year) and will be live very soon.

Website problem

My main site nigelblake.co.uk seems to have fallen off the web! as a temporary measure I've redirected the domain to my blog.
If this is your first time here why not take a look at some of my other blogs and the Flickr gallery all linked at the top right of this page.

Smart birds and cute mice

A good days photography with a couple of unexpected subjects yesterday, I would have prefered a lighter background for the Green Woodpecker rather than the dark shadows under the trees.. but I'm not complaining!

More from the pool

A day at the pool without setting up the remote camera because it was very windy, there was a constant stream of not very camera-friendly wind-blown dust at ground level, in all another good day with a good mix of visiting birds, and lots of juvenile Yellow Wagtails and Starlings.

Poolside birds

More adventures with the remote control camera, it is time consuming and even with far better view of what the camera is seeing and the ability to frame the image the hit rate with small birds is very low, I kept 7 out of 208 frames today.
Today I had a bad time with a stray dog that just appeared, nestled down in my new car, scoffed my sandwiches, spread mud and snott on the seats, growled and bared its teeth at me and would not allow me near, I had to jam my spade handle in its mouth so I could get hold of its collar (no owner details) and throw it out, I dont blame the dog and I'm not a violent person, but this is one irresponsible owner who is really lucky they were not there!
Yesterday it got windy so I packed all the technical stuff up and shot the Corn Buntings and the Yellow Wagtails with the 600mm when the wind dropped occasionally.

"Singing in the grain"

Some more work at the pool over the weekend, but the strong wind on Sunday was blowing such a lot of dust across the ground I packed up the remote camera. The Corn Bunting were still singing and clinging on for dear life as they waved about like flags in the strong gusts, however in the picture it looks like a nice calm summers day!

Yellwags and Lappos

A bit of gardening at one end of the pool to add some vegetation and a change of lens (28-80 at 60mm) so I could work on the Yellow Wagtails soon generated some interesting shots, just needed the light to improve. The Lapwings are just getting easier to work with each day, they are so used to me being there that yesterday I hand fed one of them with earthworms. They also don't react to the camera at all, so I am able to shoot on continuous and as wide as 20mm, (the shot here is 25mm). I saw a couple of juvenile Lapwings today, hopefully I'll get them at the pool soon as well.

Lapwing, perfect Focus

I spent the morning sorting out getting a new car, (clue in the title, no not a Ford Lapwing!!), and then I was at the pool again this afternoon, a very frustrating couple of hours to start with as the Lapwing generally was only there when the sun wasn't, and when I finally got some images I found I had a big blob of mud on the lens, most annoyingly I had a great flight shot, and some Swallows collecting mud, all totally unusable as a result!
I cleaned the lens and got set for another long wait, eventually the Lapwing and Pied Wagtail performed perfectly and I had some fantastic evening light too, a good day in the end!

Pool shots again.

More time spent on the Lapwing at my pool, i've also been shooting more on the Wagtails and Corn Buntings too, and then had a new visitor, a young Hare.

Getting there

Still not quite the shot I have in my mind's eye, but getting closer, if only the cloud had been less dense and there had been some blue patches, and sunlight on the Lapwing....... so back again for another go today with a waterproof camera cover as I would quite like it in the rain; with the pool surface covered in splashes it would look ace!

More Lapwings and Corn Buntings

Some days nature photography can be slow and frustrating, and some days it can really "blow your socks off"; 4 images from a very good day. The Lapwing is totally unphased by the remote camera, however it does get too close sometimes, even at 20mm!
The Corn Bunting is now using the song perch so often that I really don't need any more singing, preening, scratching and wing stretching shots, again utterly unbothered by me being there to the point that I can change the perch between visits.