Blacktoft Sands Visit

My daughter and I visited Blacktoft Sands for a few hours while on-route to Spurn Point for the weekend. There was an excellent selection of waders which were viewable from the Singleton Hide.  These included Dunlin, Ruff, Redshank, Greenshank, Curlew Sandpiper, Snipe, Spotted Redshank and single Little Stints and a Purple Sandpiper.

Cattle and Little Egret from the Singleton Hide

A small part of the lagoon holding many waders.  Included in the photo are Dunlin, Curlew Sandpiper and Ruff.

Another view of the waders including a Little Stint which was absent for most of the time.

Redshank - This individual flew reasonably close
to the hide allowing this photo to be taken.

Pink-footed Geese - A couple of skeins flew over.

Camera Testing at Little Marlow GP

 I have only had the Sony RX10 for a few weeks and I wanted to see just how much detail I could see in photos taken on my local patch at Little Marlow.  I basically wanted to see if I could get sufficient detail to ID difficult species (but none present today) so I practised on the common species.

Little Egret taken from the south bank.  

Gulls - Taken from the Point

Herring Gull from the Point

Gulls taken from the Point

Lesser Black-backed Gull - taken from the Point.

Black-headed Gulls from the Point.

Black-headed Gull - Reasonable close

Black-headed Gull - Fairly distant and against trees.

Black-headed Gull - Fairly distant.

Ham Wall RSPB Reserve

 This was a brief visit and a stopover when we were travelling home from the Minehead area.

Ham Wall is a fantastic wetland reserve with a huge area of reed beds and open water.  Good numbers of Bitterns and Great White Egrets breed here as well as Marsh Harriers and many other species.  My visit was not at the best time of year as the birds were generally not showing well and rather quiet.  A Spring visit is recommended.

Great White Egret - One of several seen.  Rather distant.

Great Crested Grebe - Several were seen.

Exmoor Birds

 A random stop along the river Exe in Exmoor, Somerset soon produced a Dipper.  Photographed with my new Sony RX10.

A short video clip.

Juvenile Stonechat in The Valley of the Rocks near Lynton.

Adult male Stonechat

N Devon - New Camera Test Photos

 I was trying to see what sort of quality photos I could get using the Sony RX10 handheld and taking photos of fairly distant birds.  This would then compare to my previous camera which was a Panasonic G6 Micro 4/3rds camera.

Starting with a few close ups.

White-tailed Bumblebee in the garden of our holiday accommodation.

Honey Bee 

Goldfinch - Rather distant and because of this I am happy with the end result.

Crow - I'm pleased with the end result of this rather distant black bird.  

The following in flight photos of Herring Gulls show all of the main ID features of the species.  The birds were all fairly distant.  I have to admit that not all of my attempts at in flight shots came out as well as these.

Starling - Taken in poor light and again rather distant.

Overall I am very happy with these results.  The camera is able to take good quality photos at a distance.  When close the photos can be stunning!

Bideford - New Camera Practice

 My new Sony RX10 Mk IV arrived a few days before I went on holiday.  So this was the first few attempts using the new camera after setting the camera up for wildlife use.

This House Sparrow conveniently turned up in the garden of our accommodation while I was testing the camera.

This Curlew was rather distant as the full zoom, full frame photo shows.

This crop of the Curlew gives a reasonable result.

A stationary Herring Gull was easy enough

Finally a couple of flight shots of Herrings Gulls worked well.

Common Redstart at Jennings Farm

 Redstarts are passage migrants in Buckinghamshire and not particularly easy to find.  However they do turn up at regular locations while on migration and Jennings Farm is such a place.

A bird was found the previous evening by Matt Milne and relocated the following day.  I was there with David Bevan and we had good views of two Redstarts, a male and a female.  Also present along the same hedgerow was a Wheatear and a Whinchat, also passage migrants in Buckinghamshire. 

A brief video clip follows.