Here is part 2 of my 2016 review, carrying on from part 1.
I had a wildlife trip up to Yorkshire for an early birthday present and one of my targets was a common hawker dragonfly. I had seen a probably common hawker in the Cairngorms back in 2014, but I’d never had a good view. I was luck enough to spot 2 or 3, a couple of which perched in the poor light, sadly halfway up a pine tree.
So not a great photo, but a species I’ve wanted for a while.
We spent the afternoon at the coast and had a close encounter with a seal.
The next day was a trip out with Yorkshire Coast Nature wildlife tours, where when I was seawatching I sa my first Arctic Skuas. The later afternoon was spent on a boat out in the North Sea, where I finally fulfilled my ambition of seeing a ‘proper’ (baleen) whale when a minke whale appeared. The best photo was probably this one of it swimming past a juvenile guillemot and its father.
I also got my best shot of my favourite seabird, a fulmar.
In August, back in Essex, while trying to photograph some southern migrant hawker dragonflies, this fox cub was worryingly tame, this shot is uncropped at 300mm…
I suspect it was being fed, but thankfully seemed to soon learn people = dogs/danger.
I did eventually manage a photo of the southern migrant hawkers, this mating pair was probably the best I got.
The day before I had rescued an egg bound grass snake and taken it to the Excellent folks at Essex Wildlife Hospital, so the next day I was surprised to see another grass snake, in the same pond and it posed better than any had before. The harden scientist in me knows this a coincidence, but its hard not to think nature was giving me a thank you for my good deed the day before!
I saw the fox cub a second time one morning, but this is the last time I saw it and it was a lot more wary. Managed one of my best fox photos that day.
One highlight at work was being pointed in the direction of these cracking little bee hunting wasps.
I had a second, much closer encounter with the southern migrant hawkers in August.
And a trip up to Suffolk to see the Fen Raft Spiders wasn’t very successful, but I did get this Beewolf at Minsmere on the way home
Towards the end of August the Essex Field Club held their annual show, where Eden Falconry brought this beautiful Goshawk.
At the end of August, my years of catching crickets actually ended being useful for conservation as I helped with catching and relocating the rare wart biter crickets in Sussex.
In September we had a family holiday to Cornwall, where I squeezed in a bit of wildlife photography. On West Looe beach I tried some rockpooling and found little, but a family I met there kindly let me photograph their finds which included this worm pipefish (a first for me) and a hermit crab.
In Newquay Harbour this impressive Greater Black-backed gull tucked into a dead edible crab.
In Looe harbour (the first place I saw this species 20 odd years ago) this little egret caught a sea scorpion fish.
I had a quick second rockpooling session in West Looe, where I found my first ever brittlestar.
This shag swam past as we were crabbing in Polperro Harbour.
I had the opportunity later in the month to photograph a marsh frog tadpole.
In October I got my best shots yet of a Saucerbug.
I also bettered by wood ant shots, but still haven’t got the shot I’ll be happy with, one for next year.
On Halloween, rather appropriately, this bat was out in the day and needed to be rescued (again off to South Essex Wildlife Hospital) and it turned out to almost certainly be a rare Nathusius’s pipistrelle.
In November I had a couple of trips to London, both of which ended up with at least some of the day in Regents Park, with lots of time spent with the herons there.
I also got what is probably my best ever magpie photo.
As the weather got colder, this meant more pond creatures got photographed including this is Berosus water beetle.
I also finally put together my reflection pool set up, which was rewarded by this blue tit one frozen morning.
I have a few gaps in my pond creature photo library, such as the low number of images of the common flatworms. So I made a point of getting some and this was a favourite.
Ostracods are another, more challenging, gap. This shot took extension tubes, a 1.4x teleconvertor, 100mm macro and some patience. I’m still not 100% happy…..but again, theirs always 2017!
A few days before Christmas I thought I’d try and finish the year with a nice bittern shot. After a 5am start, I got to Minsmere for sunrise and the bittern showed, only to fly off before coming anywhere near close. I did however get this snipe out in the open in sun later on.
So 2016 was a year with a few nice firsts and some photos I am very happy with, i hope yours were as productive. Hope you all have a happy 2017!