Digiscoped Lapwing.

In flight Northern Lapwing (Vanellus vanellus) are highly acrobatic as they roll and tumble through the air and easily identified by its rounded black and white wings. It is also very vocal hence the common name 'Peewit' derived from its shrill call.

On the ground they quietly go about their daily chore of hunting small invertebrates, worms and insects but always keeping a watchful eye out for overhead predators and they are quick to react by bursting into flight at the slightest hint of disturbance. These images were digi-scoped of an individual about 100 yards away that kept disappearing from view behind the numerous moss covered hillocks on the inland grazing pasture at Farlington Marshes.

Both images were shot using shutter-priority (1/1000 and 1/1600 respectively) and then cropped.  FAB. 

The Moon Lighting The Way Forward.

My view of the early evening sky as I left work on Thursday 29th October. A very quick snap taken using the 70-300 lens. During the following days we have experienced more rain storms.

Five days later.. a full moon tonight in all its glory. Digiscoped using the Samsung S1030 from the back garden on a much colder night with little or no cloud but a forecast of more bad weather on the way!

The countdown at work continues......just 3 days to go. In the meantime we have an important event in the 'EB' household on Thursday 5th so please stop by again. FAB.

Digiscoping Today Week 2: Mandarin Duck

In a previous post 'New Life on the Ponds' I mentioned finding a male Mandarin Duck but due to the distance between me and the subject (80- 100 yards) I couldn’t get a decent close image using my DSLR. So here was the dilemma; whilst I was carrying my Swarovski scope and compact camera I hadn’t picked up the tripod but I did have a monopod and it was very, very windy. So in an effort to steady the ‘rig’ I plunged the foot of the monopod into the soft ground next to a tree and held the scope body against the trunk to gain some stability whilst trying to focus, keep everything absolutely still (practically impossible even using both hands) and get a decent picture. On this occasion I purposely used very little zoom on the camera and here are the results.
I must try to remember the tripod in future!

The Mandarin (Aix galericulata) is one of the most ornate of all waterfowl species, closely related to the North American Wood Duck, and has been revered in Far Eastern culture since at least the fifth century; they were thought to be monogamous, and therefore a symbol of fidelity so pairs were presented as wedding gifts to Japanese newly-weds. It was introduced at the beginning of the 20th century with the bulk of the UK feral population, estimated at 3500 breeding pairs in 1988, located in southern England. Formerly abundant, numbers of Mandarin in their native Far East have declined due to habitat destruction (mainly logging) and over-hunting to a total population size of around 80,000 birds (1970-1987). As a non-native species it is not protected in the UK.

As you can see the orange head and ‘sails’ and especially the dramatic, tapering white eye-stripe makes the male unmistakable. In contrast the female is similar to female Wood Duck with grey head, pink bill and heavily spotted breast but the key field mark is the shape of the white marking around the eye that extends backwards in a long narrowing tapering line whereas in the female Wood Duck it is shorter, broader and blunter.
Mandarins feed by dabbling or walking on land and mainly eat plants and seeds, especially beech mast. When breeding they are a secretive species, feeding mainly near dawn or dusk, and perching in trees hanging over or nearby still or fast-flowing water during the day. Normally only one brood; a clutch size of 6 to 12, with incubation taking 28-30 days with fledging in 40-45 days. It is quite normal to see Mandarins forming small flocks in winter, but they rarely associate with other ducks.

Digiscoping Today: Great Tit Update 1a.

The weather has reverted to grey and damp so I am posting images taken on the weekend but this time by digiscoping. My shooting position was nearly too close for the minimum focus range for the Swaro 80HD scope and unlike using the DSLR there is a longer time delay when pressing the shutter so you need to keep the whole rig absolutely still, hence the use of a tripod.

The compact camera was set on 'auto' and all three shots were taken at f3.5; ISO80 and exposure 1/125. The overall clarity is much better than the images in the "Great Tit Update 1" post. If you click the link you can also compare the results.

I clearly need to practise more with the settings with the DSLR!

This is a cropped image of the full photo above.

This is a another cropped image which has been slightly sharpened.

Digiscoping Today: Sturnus vulgaris

When I started blogging at the beginning of the year many of the photos posted were 'digiscoped' using my Samsung S1030 Pocket Camera and my Swarovski ATS 80 HD Scope using either the 30x wide or a 20 - 60x zoom eyepiece. Originally the camera was hand held to the eyepiece and results were not to good. Thanks to a brilliant father, who designed and made a lightweight adaptor for me the results quickly improved.

Dale at Discovering Alpine Birds has set up a new blog carnival/meme where digiscopers can add links to recent photos called 'Digiscoping Today' and he kindly asked me to join in. So I have located the very first picture taken using the above set up with the "home made" adaptor so that my father could see the result.

Whilst I know this species is not so popular on the other side of the Atlantic, the Starling (Sturnus vulgaris) is a regular visitor to our garden. It also has a rich repertoire of song, often incorporating imitations of other species and many other sounds such as car alarms etc.

Please check out other digi-images by clicking on the following link: