Tuesday, July 01, 2008

Down South

I have just come back from a week's holiday with my better half in Lymington, at the bottom end of the New Forest. I didn't get much time to get out with camera but managed a couple of short sessions on some saline lagoons that run along the coast. A few oystercatchers were present that allowed fairly close approach but I thought I would concentrate on some fly shots.

There were quit a few terns moving between the lagoons' islands, where they were nesting, and the Solent where they were going on fishing expeditions. Sandwich Tern (although I only saw one), Common Tern and Little Tern were all to be seen. The Little Terns were out of range so I concentrated on the Common Terns. Fortunately one bird landed by my feet which allowed a potrait.

Even though I was a very distant from the nesting islands, birds will still come over to warn me off. A screaming fly-by

The main problem I encountered was wind and light being in opposite directions but a few shots were still to be had.

I managed a photo of the solitary passing sandwich tern

The highlight of the trip was a very close encounter with a Little Egret which allowed a very close approach, to the extent I had to keep backing away to fit the bird in frame.
A moment of self-reflection.
The spines on this stickleback did not help it from an inevitable fate.

2 comments:

kjpweb said...

Very nice to see the little egret up close. Looks very much like our Snowy Egret, but seems to be a little larger, and other than the Snowy has the breast feathers that we are used to from the Great Blue Heron. Coloration around the bill is different, too (maybe). Snowy is yellow, turns pale red only during breeding season.
Thanks!
Cheers, Klaus

Rich Steel said...

Thank you Klaus. It was a pleasure for me as well to get up so close and personnel to a Little Egret and watch it fishing. The Little Egret are quite small birds and the fish in th last shot is probably around 3 inches long to give some scale. The Little Egret gain the longer feathers during the summer. We get the occasional Great White Egret here which are impressively large birds.

Cheers

Rich

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