Garden visitors

A great afternoon in the garden today, birds where everywhere and for once the sun was out and light was pretty good.

I managed to snap almost everything that came into the garden and have selected my four favourites for the post.

In order: Long Tailed tit, Greater Spotted Woodpecker, Chaffinch, Nuthatch.

All photos taken with Nikon D70 + Sigma 170-500mm 17/01/2009.

Still no sign of the Siskins yet, but here's what we have had in our garden today: Goldfinch (7), Bluetit (1), Great tit (2), Nuthatch (1), Chaffinch (5), Blackbird (2), GS Woodpecker (1), Long Tailed Tit (3), all within about an hour and a half.

Bluetits are nowhere near the number we had about 5 years ago so I will be putting a few nest boxes up soon to try and attract them back, fingers crossed.

Pics at last

Finally a few photos to post, here's some from this afternoon, just the usual Long Tailed Tit, Coal Tit and Goldfinch all shot at ISO800 and in my garden.

Hope you like the shots.

Thanks to everyone who keeps dropping by and I hope you all have a great Christmas and happy new year. Mike.

Coal and Long Tailed

Not a bad day in the garden today, we've had all the Tits, Coal, Blue, Great and Long Tailed.

Here are a few shot of the Coal Tit I managed to get, hope you like them.

To see more of my Coal Tit shots click HERE and the juveniles click HERE.

For all the Tit family click HERE and click into the images.


This one was a bit more of a surprise I haven't seen these in my garden for a year or so and it landed just before I was about to put fresh food out so it might not come back, fingers crossed it will.

To see more Long Tailed Tit shots click HERE.


All photos taken 14/09/2008 with Nikon D70 + Sigma 170-500mm.

Weekend Outings

Our first outing of the long weekend took us to Bolton Abbey, located towards the Yorkshire Dales, its a really nice place to take a walk. We had initially gone there in the hope to catch a Dipper along the river, but never saw it, the only birds we saw where Mallards and some Goldcrest.

I tried to photograph the Goldcrest, but they where just too fast and the photos have been deleted they where that bad.

Here's a couple of shots showing the abbey and the river.

Then it was back to my local patch / Martin Mere to see what was going on there.

Whooper swans are still there in thousands.

I sat in the Janet Kier hide for a while watching the Reed Buntings and Long Tailed Tits, they are such acrobatic birds the LTT as you can see in my photo, holding on to the twig with one leg whilst holding a seed in the other and trying to eat it. 2nd shot is a female Reed Bunting.

Wigeon are another favourite of mine and are in good numbers over the reserve.

Photos taken 21/03 and 22/03.

Flight

Whenever I go out I generally aim to get at least a few good shots and generally take a couple of hundred, the beauty of digital photography.

Birds in flight is something I find very difficult and the smaller the birds the faster they are and they never stay still, more importantly the light conditions need to be very good.

I always shoot in Aperture priority and let the camera choose the shutter speed to suit, here are a few of the photos I have taken so far.

From top to bottom: Long Tailed Tit, Common Tern, Mute Swans.

All photos taken with Nikon D70.