Along the River

Nothing planned on this day, no getting up at the crack of dawn to catch any particular wildlife at the ‘golden hour’, it was just a case of going out and enjoying this rare spell of warm, dry and sunny weather and where better to spend a day than by a river and watch nature go by. At first glance the river seemed completely quiet with just the sounds of songbirds in the bushes and trees but staying out of sight.  One of the best things you can do to see nature is just stop, sit down somewhere quite and wait, which is what I did.  The surface of the water had swarms of flies above it and it seemed strange to me that nothing was taking advantage of this possible glutton of food, but after a few minutes there would be the sound of a splash and the sight of a ripple then later, I would just catch sight of a fish leaping out, then another and another. Fifteen minutes later a female Mallard with her chicks came along and was clearly an opportunity not to be missed as both she and her chicks went into a feeding frenzy.  Unfortunately, conditions weren’t favourable to get a decent image to portray this.  Despite the bright late morning sunshine a combination of bright reflections on the water and shadows of nearby trees created a massive difference in exposure and 1/800th was the best I could do at f5.6.  This meant sudden movements to grab the flies resulted in their being either out of focus or blurred.  Additionally I had a cheaper card in the camera and the buffer was struggling at the ten frames per second I needed to hopefully ‘catch the moment’. You can see the flies in all the images including where they are going for one.  The highlighted out of focus circles you see are also flies giving you an idea of their numbers.

Sharing a family meal

Just out of reach for this little one!

On the wider more open parts of the river, the same swarms of flies were feeding the Sand Martins and I gave it another attempt to photograph these nimble flyers as I had tried last week.  I had the same problem of only managing to get a focus lock on them whilst they had the sky as the background, once they went below the tree line, focus was gone.  Without wanting to get too close to the nests I managed to find a way down to the rivers edge giving me more of a lower view point and so more sky.  Unfortunately I also had a limited viewpoint due to trees to my right and left and after watching them for a while to see any flight patterns, I noticed they often came in from my right before heading for the nests.  I couldn’t focus on them while they were behind the tree coming in, but I could still track them in my view finder and when they came to a clear spot, hit the focus which then gave me barely a second and a half to lock on, and take as many images as possible before they reached the trees on the left.  I was just getting the hang of this when I realised the rivers tide was coming in and was now at my feet so had to abandon my position and make my way back up to the top of the bank. It’s certainly one of my photographic ambitions to get a good in flight image of one of these summer visitors – Sand Martin, Swallow, Swift or House Martins.  I feel it is possible under ideal conditions but I will need to find a better location so will probably not be happening this year.

A quick note about my camera My main camera and the one I used for this is the Canon 1d Mk III which some may know had, when it first came out, complaints and issues with the focusing.  My camera is within the list of early model numbers ‘effected’ by this issue though to be honest didn’t give it any thought as it seemed no worse certainly than the Mk IIn I was using before.  It also doesn’t have the ‘dot’ in the battery compartment to show it has been sent in to be fixed, so I have been wondering if my camera should be better at focusing than it is.  The problem is I have nothing to compare it with other than the Mk IIn.  I believe it can still be fixed free of charge so may do this.  If it is supposed to focus better than it does especially against backgrounds that are cluttered, then this is an amazing camera despite it age now.

On the way back I noticed Sand Martins in the distance mobbing what I thought was a Buzzard.  It was gliding along the air currents typical of a Buzzard but when I saw it flapping its wings I thought Sparrowhawk, but I’ve never seen a Sparrowhawk, typically a woodland bird, flying high circling like a Buzzard would.  Once I took a picture and enlarged it on the cameras LCD screen it was clearly a Sparrowhawk, female.

Above - Sparrowhawk doing a Buzzard impersonation.  Below – enlargement clearly identifying it as a female Sparrowhawk

Below a few more snap shots this time of the first Swallow I’ve seen this year (and for a few years)

Finally, an image of this magnificent beast in very idyllic settings