The water vole is a species that has evaded me for quite a while. I have had a few sightings over the years, but no good photo opportunities. So when a friend offered to show me the a water vole platform on a small stream local to me, I didn’t hesitate. While there a small water…
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Last weekend I was playing with my camera in my father-in-law’s garden. We were comparing the results to my sister in law’s high-end compact camera by photographing a small flock of starlings on a neighbours roof. The 300mm with 1.4x tele was far superior as expected, but then it is multiple times the price! I…
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Yesterday I had an afternoon to myself, so headed down to Roding Valley Recreation ground where there has been a red-necked grebe staying for a week or so. It would be a new bird species for me and there would be a chance of a decent photo based on reports from other birders/photographers. I headed…
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Had a quick family visit to Rainham Marshes this morning and it was an enjoyable couple of hours. I didn’t have the time to put my usual effort in, but had some good sightings that are worth posting about. I started off saying hello to Howard who was set up on the sea wall and…
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Going back to a couple of weekends ago, while on my birthday wildlife weekend, I spent an afternoon at a seal colony. Descending the steep cliff path down towards the colony, we could see a number of seals out on the rocks. The weather was warm and this small seal was sitting on a rock,…
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A few years ago I dug a pond and this year it had it’s first frogspawn. I had loads of tadpoles for much of the spring and summer as a result and they began emerging as frogs a couple of months ago. There are still some around my pond and on a dull day last…
DetailsA couple of weekends ago I was planning to go to Dorset to find some raft spiders, but for various reasons I had to cancel that trip and instead I ended up in Yorkshire. The first day was spent up on the North York Moors and the date was the 12th of August, the start…
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I recently had the opportunity to photograph an adult Great crested newt (under license) properly for the fist time using my photo aquarium and natural light. I have seen the photo on survey many times, but this was the first time I had found one in the day time and when I had my set…
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On Monday I decided to have a day out with the family, and we ended up heading to RHS Hyde Hall. I have only visited a few time before, and never on a sunny day in summer. On my previous visits I had suspected the ‘new’ lake there would be good for dragonflies, and I…
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Day 3 of my holiday (4/7/17) and I had booked a trip with Marine Discovery Penzance for the afternoon, but the weather was grey a drizzly. I tested my camera gear (and my technique with the new set up!) on a house sparrow. I was on the Marine DIscovery boat soon after I arrived in…
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