Thursday 28th May, 2015, Peasholm Park, Scarborough and the sea front. In Peasholm park we found this little bird, I am not sure what it is. It would be known, in the birding world as a LBJ-a little brown jobby! I am thinking chifchaf or garden warbler. It was lovely to be there. The trees up the ravine are enormous with a fantastic canopy and are cathedral like. In addition to this we spotted a greater spotted woodpecker chick.

Week commencing 25/5/15 we had a fantastic birding week. On Tuesday 26th May we went to Washington WWT and had a great time! There were a number of rarer birds there as part of their conservation effort but there was also the common garden birds as shown here. These birds were baited at a bird table filled with various foods. It even included a squirrel proof cage which wasn't squirrel proof at all! I've never seen so many bullfinches in my life, certainly not as many in one place. There were at least 4 who came to feed including one female. 

 These pictures are taken with a 500mm mirror lens and even though they were quite close, these are still cropped, but they are well focussed with a lot of detail in the feather even at ISO 5000 in most cases. The highlight was the jay-a very cautious bird, not seen at close quarters at all, and the greater spotted woodpecker that managed to find the fat and peanuts stuffed in the tree bark. You can tell its a mirror lens because the bokeh (the out of focus circular blurry bit behind the birds) is caused by the mirror lens.

 I also like the picture of the magpie that had found a food stash in the tree. You can clearly see the blue iridescence on its wings beneath its white feathers. Its a stunning bird close up.

Avocets are always a joy to see. Such a smart and delicate bird but one with a temper! They often see off birds feeding close to where they are.

Iceland off the holiday list

Iceland-off the holiday list

I have wanted to go to Iceland for 30 years, I believe the country to be spectacular for photography, then I saw this film. Puffins being killed by locals for food, eggs taken from birds nests on a sheer cliff face to give an alternative to battery eggs (and sold to local supermarkets)-when a simple solution to that would maybe be to create a farm which provides eggs from chickens that aren't battery farmed (!). Then rounding up wild horses taking them straight to market, new foals, and the stress of coming into contact with humans, awful. One man in the film said that being one with nature and the horses was being in tune with nature and having respect for it, I think he was confusing respect for domination. I wont spend my money there, I'll make the best of what

NG5 wildlife sightings

One of my favourite places is a small reserve close to where I live. In recent months this year, the following have been spotted:
3 herons, numerous teal, red crested pochard, coots, moorhen, mallards, blackcap, wren, and jack snipe.

Sightings yesterday were mallard, greylag geese, a small heron, wren and I think a blackcap heard. Also seen were a flock of long-tail tits and goldfinch were heard. Red crested pochard were still there.