I spend a few hours in the Stour Valley Local Nature Reserve in Dorset, and in that time I am treated to the sights of a Great Spotted Woodpecker, a kingfisher, a buzzard, a Red Admiral butterfly and the chap on the right; the only one of which I got a shot of. The others were simply too far away or too quick.
Oh yes, the chap on the right is a Little Egret.
As I mentioned above the flora (as well as the fauna) is kicking off, and the photograph of the Common Hawthorn flowering against a blue sky sums up spring for me, and I couldn't resist the opportunity once again to take a few shots.
I also spend a while talking to a fisherman on the riverbank - not my cup of Earl Gray, fishing - but you never know what gem of local information these people may impart, and today I'm lucky. I know otters have re-established themselves on the Dorset Stour, but as yet I have not had the pleasure of seeing, let alone photographing one. All that is to change, it seems.
"Otters! You want otters?" the angler asks. Yes, I say, and he goes on at some length, giving me precise directions to the location where I will find them. Seemingly satisfied that I have understood him to the letter, and to drive the point well and truly home, he concludes his deliverance with: "...and if you don't find them there, then you won't find them anywhere. I stake my reputation on it". What reputation, I think to myself - I have no idea who he is! I thank him and cycle off.
Tomorrow is time for a spot of reconnaissance... and a long lens.
Top: 300mm f/4D AF-S Nikkor. 1/2500 second at f/7.1. -1stop EV compensation. ISO 400
Below: 24-70mm f/2.8D AF-S Nikkor. 1/800 second at f/5.6. + 0.33 EV compensation. ISO 400
© 2012
3 comments:
He may be a most reputable fisherman. You just never know.
I am, frankly, jealous. It's not fair that you saw all those things in one day. I saw a bumble bee and a cat. And a fly experienced an untimely death when it landed on my painted door. So for a brief time I saw a live fly too.
Humph.
:-) P
(And also I am getting rather disgruntled by the long words I have to type in to prove I am not a robot. They sound like dinosaurs to me. This one say 'Stegaror'. Rrrrrr. )
Pixie: for all I know he may have been the fisher of men!
I was very lucky to see what I did, this afternoon. Although I see kingfishers all the time on the reserve, and hear the woodpeckers frequently, the buzzard was a surprise - and a long way off.
Still a bee and a cat is nothing to be sniffed at. :-)
I have never sniffed a cat.
:-P
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