Lively Buck Roe Deer

Just occasionally on some mornings things just all come together perfectly !!

A lovely still summer morning with the first rays of the sun lighting up a silage field and its hedgerow.

Enter a fine lively young buck dressed in his best red summer coat

He is very alert and behaving a bit scatty and suddenly goes off on one for no reason at all

Galloping off across the field he catches sight of a couple of rabbits and chases them off right through the hedgerow and that was the last I saw of him.

Perhaps a bit short and sweet but it is great to capture a bit of behaviour from a fine looking animal in good early morning sunlight,      HAPPY DAYS !!

Peregrine Prey Possession

This happy looking juvenile Peregrine has just eaten its fill from a large pigeon on the rock behind it,

The prey had been presented by one of its two hungry parents thirty minutes before to allow the young bird the first pickings,

Now the two adult birds want their share of the kill but it seems that the juvenile is getting a bit possessive regarding the prey when a adult flies in to retrieve it>

The patient parent decides to give way to the juvenile perhaps thinking it was still hungry.

But the juvenile is full and starts to clean off its beak in some stone crop vegetation which is a sure sign to the parent birds that it has finished eating.

And then from an amusing head upside down angle the juvenile spots a parent bird coming back for the prey again !!

The juvenile goes all possessive over the prey again and once more the adult bird back off without taking the prey.

No sooner had the adult bird left when the juvenile had a sudden change of mind and flew from the location leaving the prey.

Both of the hungry adult birds flew in simultaneously to claim the prey and it was the smaller  agile male that latched onto the large Pigeon which was lifted to be taken to one of their favoured plucking points where they will both get their deserved share of the spoils.

Dragonfly Portraits

With the hot sunny weather prevailing the local ponds and waterways are buzzing with Dragonfly and Damselfly.

I went back to windmill farm ponds yesterday afternoon looking for Dragonfly reflections and  general behaviour images and was pleased with the posted results.

If you decide to venture out there take some repellent or keep covered up as the local horsefly population has also soared at the moment.

Seal Appeal

While working on Peregrine and Kestrel at Botallack yesterday afternoon I happened to notice a Grey Seal come to the surface to breath.

The water was calm and a lovely clear blue which produced a good surface detail around the seal.  

After a couple of minutes the seal rolled over and dived again but returned to the surface at the same spot every fifteen to 30 minutes or so.

This reminded me of the days when I used to work with seals underwater in the Scillies and  Lundy Island.

I new by the regular appearances of the seal several times at the same location that it was cat napping alongside a large rock that could be clearly seen at the seabed.

I have fond memories of times when I used to seek out such activities in my old underwater photography days and on finding such a seal would work with it both at the seabed and the surface for several hours looking for close focus wide angle portraits during which time the seals would sometimes become very relaxed and at times even sleep while I was less than a metre from them.

Below is a close focus portrait of a relaxed Grey Seal taken on one of my last Scillies seal trips way  back on the 8th April 2004.    HAPPY DAYS !!

Peregrine's Maiden Flight

Looking at this fine juvenile Peregrine it is perhaps hard to believe that it is just thirty eight days old and experiencing its Maiden flight around high Cornish cliffs.

It was looking good in the air but then comes the tricky bit of landing which takes them quite some time to master and this one flies straight into a section of vertical cliff without any ledges.

It tries but fails to grip the steep crumbly surface and has to take-off again.

This time it manages to land on a small ledge but is not happy and calls to the watching adult birds for assistance.

It comes by way of its mother carrying a grisly looking juvenile Jackdaw prey offering which was what the juvenile was tempted into the air for in the first place.

Now it was the adult birds time of trouble as the juvenile did not have skill enough to select a landing place where the mother could land with her prey offering as well so she returned to her own ledge,

The young bird took off again and this time managed to get back to the location where its mother was now perched and still holding the prey,

So our juvenile Peregrine has survived its first flights and now has the young Jackdaw prey which its mother leaves for it to feed on.

The next few months will be a steep learning curve where all young peregrine have to sharpen up their skills if they are to survive the first winter that lies ahead of them !!

Breakfast is served

A female Kestrel take to the air excitedly as she see her mate flying back into their territory with prey in the early morning sunshine.

The male heads for their well used hand-over point and lands with pinpoint accuracy.

The female is their in a flash to take the prey from the male mouth to mouth and move away in less than a second.

She removes some of the thicker hair from the back of a luckless female vole to make digesting it a bit easier for her three week old chicks.

That done she lifts the prey in her beak to keep her legs free for landing and checks that her chicks are visually responding at her tight nest site entrance.

There is something really special about taking classic 'Kestrel with Prey' shots in the early morning light around the Cornish coastline and watching them prepare it for their family before:

                                                                     Breakfast is Served  !!

Great Spotted Woodpecker - Juvenile feeding behaviour

I found watching Great Spotted Woodpecker feeding their young quite fascinating for as they return to feed them the adult birds go straight on the defensive to outwit the sharp forward jabbing beak of the inexperienced juveniles

In the shot above the male flies in towards a perched Juvenile from a higher level and you might think as I did that this looks like an idea head to head location for feeding !

Not so !  On landing he immediately starts to lower his posture looking to place the sawn-off tree stump between them.

The juvenile gets impatient but lowers itself as well.

But when it tries to lunge again to grab the food it finds the stump in the way and the adult is still in control of the food..

The youngster tries a quick sideways move to come around the stump.

But the adult is quicker and moves down and then around the stump.

 When the juvenile catches up on his side of the stump the adult is already reaching out to safely deliver the food.

So the juvenile has had his first lesson in manners and been feed.  The male woodpecker now flies off to collect more food while the juvenile waits a little more patiently in the same location.