MarSue Wildlife - News 2009

News 2009.

November

Well November saw us doing something for the first time and that was displaying our photos and web site at the bird fair at Martin Mere WWT and what a warm welcome we were given both from all the fellow wildlife watchers and photographers, the show organizers, other show exhibitors and of course the Great British public. Thanks to you all. If anybody out there is thinking of doing the same my recommendation would be a very big DO IT. While we were there we also took pics of the Whooper swans in their vast numbers. The other thing we have done is move house and so our visits out to our British countryside have been curtailed while we decorate and fix things, hence the slight lack of fresh photos on our site but it will pick up soon, I promise and last but not least both myself and sue wish you all a happy christmas and prosperous new year, may all your wishes come true.

Guest book

Our guest book is now up and running again, all comments left will only be displayed after being moderated every couple of days by us guys. Please feel free to leave comments because we do appreciate them.

In November we will be at the Bird Watching Festival at Martin Mere wwt centre,we look forward to seeing you there, the dates are sat 21st and sun 22nd.

August Break

Our August break saw us spending a couple of days and nights in the farmhouse at Caerlaverock WWT. The reserve was very quiet as is quite normal at this time of year so we set off in the car and headed towards Bellymack Hill Farm where they feed the Red Kites daily at 2pm. On this occasion the Kites were slow to appear as a nearby farmer had been harvesting and the birds were already quite well fed as a result, this gave us what we thought was a better photographic opportunity. By evening we were back at the farmhouse waiting for the badgers to put in an appearance for the nuts and honey that had been put out. Taking photos through glass is a challenge and we found the following helps, pre-focus during daytime and take note of settings, have lens against the window and shield glare from flash by using your hand around end of your lens, it even helps to wear dark clothing and black gloves. Another reserve we visited briefly was Ken Dee Marshes on the side of Loch Ken, there are two really good hides and a goose viewing platform, they are a fair walk from the parking area but well worth it.

We spent the rest of our holiday exploring closer to home from our caravan at Milnthorpe. One of our adventures was setting up a moth trap on a reserve in the Rusland Valley with a view to identifying and photographing the moths that we caught prior to then releasing them, we were grateful for the advice from the wardens on where and how to release them safely back into their environment. Another two reserves new to us that we visited were Roudsea Wood and Gatebarrows, both of which require a permit to be obtained from Natural England. Roudsea wood is both woodland and marsh with several footpaths and a delight during any season, Gatebarrows is an upland area with limestone pavements, on this occasion Gatebarrows gave us butterfly and dragonflies and Roudsea wood gave us excellant slow worm. We intend to visit these two sites more to discover their full potential.

News Flash

A new feature. When you see a thumbnail picture surrounded with a black border it means it is one of our specials ( best of the best ) so click on thumbnail to see a larger picture than usual. You are welcome to use these special pictures for your own personal use.

Macro

Our new purchase is the Sigma 180mm f3.5 macro lens. This is a good solid lens but as with a lot of the Sigma lenses it is a bit on the heavy side but that is the price you pay for the solid robust feel. We are only just venturing out into the Macro field and we are still experiencing a few teething problems which mainly concerns depth of field ( that is the amount of the image in focus ) but when we do get it right it is with spectacular and amazing results and baring in mind that some of the pictures are of incredibly small insects. We chose the 180mm lens so that it kept us a respectable distance from the subject, hence not scaring it away, had we only been photographing flowers and plants we probably would have gone for the 100mm lens. As with most outdoor photography we have found that natural light and a good solid tripod is the key to a good photograph.

Catastrophe in Spring

Our spring break ended early with broken bones. Whilst out on the coastline, in the sandy mud i stood, talking to Sue about our plans for the next hour when i slid very gracefully to the floor, my camera checked, phew no damage, that is until i tried to stand, a cold sweat, a pain in my ankle, it hurt, no phone signal so a long walk back to the car followed by a half hour drive to the hospital, sprained i thought, broke they said, holiday cut short. The pluses of this incident were i was wearing good wellies, we was not in mull like we normally are at this time of year and the use of a monopod as a crutch. So laid up for 7 weeks and a shortage of photo's but we still managed some of these below.

Easter

Despite the bad weather forecast we set off up to the caravan at Milnethorpe and were glad we did because the forecasters had got it wrong and it was sunny with blue sky's all weekend. We gave our chairhides their first outing and already feel that they were a good purchase, they enabled us to watch, study and photograph some of the local Rusland valley wildlife a bit closer than we may normally get. We also now use our camouflage clothing a lot more and find it a god send when taking photographs as it breaks up our outline giving us the advantage.

A lot of the birds we watched were carrying nesting material back to their nest sites and some of them were obviously courting and displaying, among these were Nuthatch, the tit family, siskin and redpoll. We also watched the antics of a little vole which kept us amused for hours, but lets not forget some of the Flora of the area of which violet, wood anemone and wood sorrel are typical for this time of year.

January/February

As with every year we start off living in our caravan for 6 weeks which gives a chance to snap some of the garden birds and wildlife, although this year we mistakingly chose a slightly darker corner, lesson learnt. Long tailed tits, blackbirds, robin and dunnock, bull finch, blue and great tits, chaff and green finch were just a few to visit our feed station along with rabbit and squirrel.

During February we also visited a superb Red Kite feeding station called Bellymack Hill Farm near Laurieston in Dumfries and Galloway. You are sure of a good welcome here with excellent photo opportunities in and out of the hide and we find its well worth being there for 4 or 5 hours around feeding time. We also visited an RSPB nature reserve called Mersehead also in Galloway. Here we had a good opportunity to get close to some Barnacle Geese which come from Svalbard, which is a group of Islands between Norway and the North Pole.

Martin Mere WWT gave us our next set of photographs, the majority of them being taken from the Swanlink hide, but having said that the other hides give superb viewing. The newest hide being the Harrier hide is also beginning to bare fruit and from this hide in the past we have seen Muntjac deer and a stoat.