Today I made another visit to the SOS Reserve at Venus Pool.
Just in time to catch some more great Autumn colours.
A beautiful clear blue sky, if somewhat hazy.
This bird, amongst all the Canada Geese present, was the only one with a ring – well two rings actually: the easy to read and somewhat fragile plastic Darvic ring; and the metal BTO ring that needs a better camera than mine to zoom in and read the embossed data. I am trying find out who, why, where?
Two Canada Geese fly off.
Four Wigeon: two ducks on the left; two drakes on the right.
Now three drakes, two showing their yellow crowns; and two ducks.
You can understand birds mistaking Herons for birds of prey: they look rather threatening as they sail overhead.
Talking of birds of prey. This Kestrel seems to be asking “are you taking my photo?”. In fact it was looking the other way and I squeaked to attract its attention to get the highlight in the eye. I think this is a first-winter bird. The breast looks rather ‘streaked’ rather than ‘rows of spots’ that characterises an adult female. Also the undertail has too many bands. Its a great-looking bird for all that.
Moorhens are splendid: the tones in their plumage are really delicate and they are not black or slate-grey but an admixture.
(Ring-necked) Pheasant males look (and are truly) exotic.
Though they look a bit dozy in close-up.
A flock of Lapwings takes to the air, lit by the sun. Here is a good place to see several hundred of these birds – an increasingly rare sight these days.
I don’t really ‘do’ photographs of birds at feeders but this male (the red on the nape tells us its a male) Great Spotted Woodpecker standing on tip-toe and just about reaching the food in the feeder was well worth making an exception for.
A Great Spotted Woodpecker in more natural surroundings. Cannot see the nape to sex this bird. Strange pink suffusion on the breast and most of the belly.
Similar feeder-exception this Nuthatch. Having reached in to get some food it is now man-handling (bird-beaking?) it to open the sunflower seed.
Another “are you taking my photo?” look.
Mr. Chaffinch apparently gazing vacantly in to the distance. A rather dull specimen.
This one hardly looking any more dynamic.
At least this one is feeding.
And a rather brighter bird perhaps indicating that the viral infection Fringilla papillomavirus that causes the growth we see on its feet is none too harmful. A similar effect of the legs can be produced by a Knemidocoptes mite but that usually also affects the base of the bill and there is no sign of that on this bird.
(Ed Wilson)
