PHOTOGRAPHS OF 2011.

Some of my favourite images of 2011,not just because of the image itself,but for the challenges that had to be overcome,the enjoyment and thrill when successful,and the memorable time spent with all the birds animals and insects over the last 12 months.Please feel free to comment on any of my images and I hope you enjoy looking at them as much as I did capturing them.

Winter Chaffinchs.

Over the last few weeks the number of Chaffinch have been building up at the local feeding station.Friday so a fall of snow and in the afternoon the sun came out for half an hour and I managed to capture some images of the Chaffinch which are shown below.           MERRY XMAS AND A HAPPY AND HEALTHY NEW YEAR TO ONE AND ALL.

A Day at Newton Marsh.

    Well actually it was about 3 hr's on windy overcast Monday.It's a long time since I've seen as many duck on Newton Marsh,mostly Widgeon with good numbers of Teal,Shoveler and Mallard as well as the resident Coots and Waterhens. One photograph captures a Great Black Back Gull causing havoc diving down at the ducks looking for a lunchtime snack.another photograph shows the harsh reality of life of a dead Widgeon with a Carrion Crow in close attention,I think the Widgeon had been killed by a Perergrine which had been disturbed from it's meal by the proximity to the road and the traffic.The Pheasant was a nice bonus although distant it made a nice composition in my eyes.

SQUABBLING GOLDFINCH.

Another post of Goldfinch this time no physical contact but plenty of squabbling,

in images 4,5,6 the bird on the left looks like it's done ten rounds in the boxing ring when you see all the scars around it's head.I'll give Goldfinches a miss for awhile after this post as I don't want you all to get bored,anyway I don't get bored taking images of these charming birds.I will store the images for a rainy day

Goldfinch Behaviour.

Over the last few weeks I have been observing goldfinch at a local feeding station trying to capture images of the birds in flight.There is always a lot of noisy squabbling and threat posturing with these birds and that is all I thought it was until I caught  some images with my camera that froze the action. I could now see how vicious these little birds could be to each other and when two birds were evenly matched in the pecking order the fighting began.They seem to lock bills twisting and turning to see which is the strongest,another tactic is to attack from above with there claws attacking the head and body of the other bird.  I make no apologies for showing the bird feeders and the quality of some of the images as they were taken using ISO 2500. to try an get a fast enough shutter speed to freeze the action in poor light.The whole purpose of this post is to show some of the behaviour of the Goldfinch and even though I have seen them squabbling plenty of times before I have never noticed physical contact until now when my camera captured it.I have posted a few of the images below and would welcome any comments.

                                                   

J. JAY'S

I've been working hard to capture images of Jays with acorns recently and I'am  very happy with the results so far.I have posted some of my efforts below and hope you enjoy looking at them as much as I did capturing them.I have a couple of images in my mind that I would like to capture so I will keep trying.