Bulgarian Nature photography day 2: Wallcreeper

What a bird! Finally caught up with a species that has eluded me for 20 odd years in at least 5 countries! High in the mountains of northern Bulgaria lies a deep ravine with steep walls on either side of the narrow valley and around 30 feet up on one of the rock faces is a regular nest site for one of the most secretive and elusive of birds, the wallcreeper. Flicking its wings constantly as it searches the rock face for insects, this butterfly-like tiny bird is a splash of crimson and blue-grey. After feeding the female on the nest, the male would do a wonderful display flight right over our heads – if only I’d had the 300mm f/2.8 instead of a 500mm, I think I would have nailed it in flight :¬\

(To see more images from Bulgaria, just click the category tag ‘Bulgaria’ from at the top of this post)

Add a comment...

Your email is never published or shared. Required fields are marked *

Bulgarian Nature Photography day 1: Ring Ouzel

I’m over in Bulgaria photographing birds and other wildlife and while Ive got internet access, I thought I’d post a species a day. Today was the first day which we spent in the mountains above Sophia where the target species were nutcracker and ring ouzel. Very heavy rain hampered the photography as the nutcrakers stayed deep in the spruce trees for shelter and the low light made for very difficult shooting conditions. Here’s a shot of ring ouzel, subspecies alpinus. You can clearly see it is much more marked than our ring ouzel, the heavy white scaling on the flanks made it a very impressive bird.

(To see more images from Bulgaria, just click the category tag ‘Bulgaria’ from at the top of this post)

Add a comment...

Your email is never published or shared. Required fields are marked *

Four Spotted Chaser – Old Moor RSPB

A brief visit to Old Moor RSPB reserve today didn’t yield much in the way of bird photography but we came across this newly emerged four spotted chaser (Libellula quadrimaculata) whose wings were just about dry but it didn’t quite have the power of flight. This meant we could take our time in terms of photographing the insect but macro work is never easy at the best of times and the constant breeze made the job twice as hard. With subjects like this, it is imperative to be parallel to the subject to retain as much depth of field as possible. The wind, however, was causing the insect to droop its wings forward a little and at these magnifications, just those few millimeters shift causes a huge loss in focus. Here are four images that I like and they were photographed using a variety of lenses, namely a 14-24mm, a 105mm macro and a 500mm with around a yard of extension tubes to drop the minimum focus distance!

four spotted chaser by John Gardner wildlife photographer

four spotted chaser (Libellula quadrimaculata)

four spotted chaser (Libellula quadrimaculata)

four spotted chaser (Libellula quadrimaculata)

four spotted chaser (Libellula quadrimaculata)

four spotted chaser (Libellula quadrimaculata)

four spotted chaser (Libellula quadrimaculata)

 

four spotted chaser (Libellula quadrimaculata) at RSPB old Moor wetlands by Yorkshire landscape and wildlife photographer John Gardner. Nature photography in the UK

 

Add a comment...

Your email is never published or shared. Required fields are marked *

Water Vole in Derbyshire

Water voles are very scarce these days so its always nice to come across one, especially when foraging on the river bank like this little guy. Made famous as ‘Ratty’ in the Wind in the Willows book, the water vole is everything but a rat. A very large vole complete with rounded face and thick ginger fur, this creature has declined massively due to loss of habitat and predation by North American mink released into the wild by anti-fur trade people as well as simply escaping from the fur farms. Currently, a massive conservation effort to help the voles and erdicate the mink is under way, but the water vole remains a scarce site along our river banks.

Add a comment...

Your email is never published or shared. Required fields are marked *

Little Owl in a quarry

Driving over the moors near Holmfirth, I spotted this little owl (Athene noctua) perched on a quarry face. Judging by the white staining it’s obviously his regular lookout post and more than likely a nest site too. I drove past, set up the 500mm and then cruised back past slowly and eventually stopped and took a few shots. The road was busier than I imagined so eventually I moved on and also the owl was just a tad to far for anything other than environmental portraits. Nice setting though, very painting like.

Little Owl (Athene noctua)

Little owl (Athene noctua) perched on quarry face near Holmfirth, West Yorkshire.

Add a comment...

Your email is never published or shared. Required fields are marked *