Peregrine take -off

The above montage of a Peregrine take-off was compiled from the sequence shown below taken on the North Cornish coast this morning,  From this take off we watched the bird swoop down to take prey off of the beach below in less than a minute but she opted to take the prey further along the coastline out of range of our lenses,

Avocet at Ryans Field

There had been an Avocet  reported on the CBWPS sightings page for several days now and I finally called in to view it on what was a mainly calm sunny afternoon today,

The bright conditions and calm waters were excellent for working with this bird with its striking black and white plumage and graceful lines reflecting well across the lightly rippled water,

The bird spent most of the two hours that I was there hoovering up small shrimps with that perfectly shaped bill and the last ten minutes cleaning and wing stretching on one of the small islands in front of the hide and it looked very much at home in its new environment,

It is a bird that we see little of at the westerly end of Cornwall and it was a pleasure to work with such a photogenic and approachable subject for a change.

Peregrine mating sequence

   

I spent this morning working with a pair of Peregrine on the south coast of Cornwall,  I was looking for mating behaviour shots and for several hours I was treated to aerial displays and even a prey handovers,

Things were looking good for mating at one stag with the pair quite close and the female calling in a submissive posture but then along came the rain and both birds took cover at different locations on the cliffs,

I was running out of time for a medical appointment which was getting a bit tight when with improved weather the female returned calling the male who flew in directly behind her to respond immediately and I was treated to a front facing mating display of which I took the whole sequence clicking up fifty two images before along with the male Peregrine I made a swift exit, 

At 150m distance this mating sequence was a bit of a stretch to achieve top quality images but these sort of shots are no 'Gimmy '  and the birds are notoriously difficult with regards to working distance tolorance so you have to work within a distance that they accept on any given day.                                                                                   

Marazion Marsh today

I spent some time enjoying the sunshine at Marazion marsh PM today while watching the local wildlife going about the business of the day, 

The male Mute Swan was busy chasing anything that looked like competition off of the water,  The Rabbits were still doing what rabbits do best but the feisty Moorhen seemed to be having a bit of trouble, 

A lone Meadow Pipit was snapping up insects along the warren and the ever present Little Egret was efficiently fishing for prey along the water margins and perhaps a little more unusual was a trio of Buzzards competing with each other in an aerial display over the back of the marsh,

Throw in a few Canada geese, Ducks and an ever elusive Snipe and everything seemed about normal for the time of year now that we are recovering from the recent cold spell,

Peregrine portraits

Some times when things are going well as you are working on any given subject another one presents itself out of the blue and as Peter Tonkin and I were working on a pair of nesting Raven featured in the previous blog,  A Peregrine flew in to land closer to us than we would try to get without spooking it,  Peter saw it coming along the coast  from several hunded metres,  It headed straight towards us to land on a rock face around twenty five metres from us giving us enough time to capture landing and take-off images when it departed a little later,   Happy Days !!

Raven behaviour

The south coast was returning to normal today following the recent snow and icy conditions,  Peter Tonkin and I decided to head out to a ravens nest site that was already actively occupied by a fine pair of Raven,   On arrival we were informed that the female was in the nest and we could plainly see the male standing guard on a lamp standard close by,  We settled down waiting for some action but apart from periodic calling the male stood guard for over an hour and a half before eventually taking off to fly out of sight along the coast,  On returning it flew to the nest site with what looked like  'An egg?' in its mouth.

After delivering its egg ?  It flew off again to return a little later and this time it looked like it had two eggs in its mouth as seen in the image below by Peter Tonkin

After the male had left for the third time the female appeared from the nest site and flew onto a grass bank at the location of the males original lamp standard,  She was looking around and calling and periodically adopting a submissive mating stance at the same time but all was in vain as:    

                It looked as though the male had flown off to Tesco's for the rest of his eggs !!

We will keep you posted on progress at this site though the next couple of months

The Beast from the East

The Beast from the East took control of our Cornish weather on the last day of February turning much of Cornwall into a white world and making travelling conditions difficult,  I decided to take a local rural walk through Chiverton Farm to capture a few images of what is for us a rare experience of snowy conditions.

I worked in Black and White as the contrast between the dark tree lines in low light levels and pure white snow looked amazing,  The wind chill factor caught up with me by the time I reached the other end of the farm an hour later and I decided that discretion was the better part of valour and retraced my steps back home to edit the images that I had taken.

Winter's 'Wildlife Window Watch'

I must just add that with Falmouth University closed today and my wife working from home,  An abundance of garden birds to photograph and a new computer programme to wrestle with,  I am pleased with the outcome and really enjoyed a perhaps to rare  family day at home,  A Gin and tonic,  A good meal and a log fire is all that is now required to complete a very interesting winters day at home !!