Focus on Drift Reservoir

Above is the view from a cover point that I sometimes use at Drift Reservoir and the images below were all taken during a three hour shoot there earlier today.


Nice to see a squirrel freely foraging about on the reservoirs open banks.

It is quite common to see fox out hunting on the shoreline and this one came very close until I fired my shutter after which it took off in a flash.

Many Grey Heron grace the banks of Drift Reservoir and reflections shots and take-off 's are there for the taking.

The resident Moorhen are always busy and they provide good reflection images from the many partially submerged tree stumps.

With plenty of small fish and dozens of tree stumps to work from Kingfishers are a common sight around Drift Reservoir.

Last but not least comes this fairly rare sighting of a nice Black Rabbit !

Fox and Badger Trail Part 1

The Fox and Badger trail that passes through our garden is a bit of a night time hot spot at the moment.

Both fox and Badger are foraging for young families which we hope will be out and about on the trail shortly.

The vixen seen here tends to be the early arrival but when the badgers arrive and bull dose their way in they rule the territory.

The Fox can really only wait for the Badger to pass through,   She has been seen nipping his bum while trying to send him on his way but it could be a very dangerous move should she get herself trapped.

Fox, Badger and our Ferrell Cat

Last night was busy in our garden with no less than three Badgers and two fox foraging around their well used trails

The fox were first on the scene just before dark and they posed quite nicely for a few portraits without any particular concern about my use of flash exposure.

The first Badger arrived at the same time as our cat so they had a bit of a stand off until the badger got within two feet at which time the cat wisely decided to back-off and once the cat was out of the way the badger continued foraging around the garden.

Foraging at Night

Before the recent bad weather conditions I built a new tree trunk prop in my garden to try to enhance the spectacle of foraging fox and badgers that visit on a nightly basis and last night I got my first chance to use it.

Both of these subjects tend to visit in the first hour or so after dark so quite often bump into each other.

The meeting is not friendly between these rivals who both tend to nip at each other from behind and on one occasion after receiving a bite to its back leg the Badger double back-heeled the Fox several feet into the air.

Since then the Fox tends to come in earlier to forage then backs off when the more powerful Badger arrives and returns very quickly once it has gone to clean up any missed tit bits.

Fox Encounters

Yesterday was a good day for Fox encounters,  The first one was completely coincidental and the second was planned

While driving down the lane to the Millpool yesterday morning an unusual event led to me capturing a few images of a fine Dog Fox:

As I slowly progressed along the lane I disturbed a squirrel picking up hazel nuts from the track,  It ran off along the lane in front of me and was immediately followed by a previously unseen perched Buzzard that was now flying along behind the Squirrel just a foot off of the ground creating a lovely action packed moment.

The buzzard came so close that it lifted the back end of the squirrel up off the ground with its talons but the squirrel shook free leaving the Buzzards talons full of fine tail fur as it dived into the nearest hedgerow.

I had been to slow to capture this action with acceptably sharp images but out from the same hedgerow that the squirrel dived into came a flustered looking dog fox that took up the running where the squirrel had left off and now I was on the case.

When it had put several metres between us the fox paused looking back to see what all of the commotion had been all about,  I had stopped the car to work on it,  The Buzzard had flown off and the squirrel was long gone so the disturbed fox now ambled off at a more leisurely pace to find a quieter spot to relax.

My second encounter was planned and one that I can work on most evenings during the summer season

For the last eight years we have been blessed with visiting local foxes and cubs looking for scraps and the odd peanut as light levels dim at dusk,

When I occasionally work on them I use diffused DTTL flash and fire the camera via remote control from inside our house but in general we tend to leave them to their supper in peace.

The two images below are of one of just two cubs that are visiting are garden at the moment and this one sometimes poses quite nicely

Longrock Fox on the Prowl

I dropped into Longrock early AM this morning on the look out for Roe deer kids but no show today.

A small flock of a dozen or so Curlew arrived while I was there and all landed somewhere near the middle of the field.

Within a few minutes a young Dog Fox also arrived on the scene from the  Marazion marsh direction.

It spent thirty minutes skirting around two sides of the field hedgerow trying to find a route through to the curlew that provided some sort of cover to allow him to get in closer.

But the Curlew had played this game with the local fox's before and that is why they always stay well away from the hedgerows at all times.

Realising that the game was up the fox back tracked towards Marazion looking for greener pastures.

Midday fox on the prowl

A rather thin looking Fox is out on a rare midday prowl looking for a good meal yesterday.

I had been watching its progress for around ten minutes when a large noisy Raven arrived on the scene.

The Raven was intent on repelling the fox from vicinity of its nest site that was close by in the cliff face.

The Raven was pushing the fox a little to hard  and it turned and snapped at the Raven which instantly backed off enough for the fox to move on.

But the Raven went back on the attack when the fox started to move towards its nest again.

This time the fox turned through 90 degrees and walked away from the raven until they both seemed happy with the distance.

The fox settled down for a bit of a rest before hunger sent it off along the track again still looking for that elusive meal that is rarely easy to find.