When I got home last night I noticed that there was a starling nest in under the roof tiles of next doors house. This it seemed would be a good opportunity to test out the 300mm and the TC-20iii teleconvertor.
A startling perches on the aerial of next doors house.
Well I finally got a new lens. A 300 2.8 VR ii and a set of teleconvertors. It’s heavy, but it’s a cracking lens.
The first time I took it out about a week ago I went to see the roe deer and took a monopod to help with the mass. In honesty it seemed to make it worse as the load is so top heavy, meaning I couldn’t keep the lens still enough for even the VR to take up the slack. The end result was I didn’t really get anything worth sharing.
The positive side of this outing was I met the ranger who was kind enough to point out the site boundary which I have never been sure of and also confirmed my suspicions on the location of the Barn owl nest in previous years.
Well it seems spring genuinely is here and it wasn’t s false alarm. On Saturday evening I had couple of hours available in the evening so went to see if I could find the roe deer.
Upon arrival I was quickly deflated as the cows where still in the field the deer frequent meaning I was probably out of luck. However I have often seen them along the river so decided to try the tow path along the other side to see if that worked.
On the walk round I spotted this Small Tortoiseshell butterfly, a sign that spring really has sprung.
A Small Tortoiseshell butterfly at the side of a path at SWT Manor Farm.
I spent another evening over at the reserve this evening. It would seem I am starting to get the hang of this wildlife thing as I not only found a single female deer almost straight away I also managed to get with in a sensible range, about 30m, without drawing attention or alerting her.
With the later evenings thanks to the clock change I was able to spend an hour at the local reserve. Things didn’t begin overly well as the cattle have been moved to the field where I had seen the roe deer previously but I started a lap anyway.
Near the start is a small ring of brambles with a grass opening in the middle. There are a few clear animal tracks in the grass so I followed one and heard the rustle of an animal moving in haste. I backed off and decided to try look from the other side.
After a brief walk I heard the noise again and there in the undergrowth a fox looked back at me.
A fox hides in thick brambles and stares out at me. This was manually focused as the camera wanted to focus on the brambles. Easier said than done on my Sigma 70-300.
After a stressful couple of weeks at work this weekend I took the opportunity to get out and explore my local nature reserve for an explore and to see what I could see. Getting out more here was a goal I set my self at the end of 2012. The idea was to get a better feel for the land and try spot where the wildlife was gathering and their routes. Continue reading
As this has been the first nice evening in weeks I took the opportunity to walk round to the Surrey Wildlife Trust reserve manor farm.
There have been reports of some great wildlife in the evenings here so I wanted to see it for my self, and tonight I got to!
A roe deer in the long grass at Surrey Wildlife Trust Manor Farm reserve
This common toad was found in our garden under a pile of hedge trimmings from the previous day. Once the trimmings were removed he didn’t hang around long and hopped off to find some shade.
One of the many fallow deer stags that stalks Bushy Park in Surrey. This was taken during the rut (deer mating season) which usually kicks off in September and lasts 1-3 months.
The deer get most active at dawn and sunset, meaning low light. However this can give some nice silhouette shots like this one.
