Mark Lawlor's Nature Blog

Well my new camera arrived and I spent all week and the next weekend threatening to throw it straight in the bin and revert back to my old one!! The photos were all too pale, the focussing kept going out of whack halfway through taking a picture and I kept pressing buttons I didn't even know were there. Highly frustrating! But after a while of persevering, and some research on the internet, and some email advice from Mike, I realised that the settings I was trying to use were all wrong for bird photography, and it was just a case of changing a few things here and there. It was clear that I would have to learn a lot, since there seemed to be twice as many things to think about on this camera compared to the last, but at least I had the basics OK for now. Some practise pics from the first week are shown below.

Willow the hound - the first photograph taken with my new camera.

Very soon I got a chance to try out the camera with a proper rare bird as a Black-winged Stilt turned up at the Claire Mare whilst we were all enjoying the Tuesday off for Liberation Day. I didn't go down to see it straight away as I thought that the light would be much better in the evening for some good photos and I was glad I waited. Not exactly difficult to pick out as it waded through the water, but it was a bit far away for any more than record shots, but luckily it came closer and closer until it was right in front of us. I managed some terrific photos and terrific views of this classy wader. Black-winged Stilt is becoming almost expected every spring nowadays and this was my fifth sighting in Guernsey - but still, always worth a twitch.

Black-winged Stilt - Claire Mare, 9 May 17

I can't work out what the heck is going on here with its legs - how's it managing to do that!? - An optical illusion - perhaps the subspecies Escher's Stilt.

The day after the Stilt, the 10th May, there was a report of a Golden Oriole in the Talbot Valley in the morning, so I headed up there during my lunch hour, not really expecting to see it but you never know (Golden Oriole is only one of two 'non-official-rarity' birds I still need for Guernsey). So I went for a stroll down the road a little way from the top of the valley and had excellent views of a male Bullfinch and two singing Firecrests. Firecrest seems to be really increasing as a breeding bird here on the island.

After school the same day I stopped at the top car park at Pulias for a quick scan out the window, when all of a sudden, the Royal Tern appeared out of nowhere right above my car and flew into Pecqueries Bay! It carried on straight away and I revved the engine to try and cut it off at the next headland. I screeched to a halt there and waited for it to fly over but there was no sign of it doing so. I walked back towards the bay and found the bird just sitting there on the rocks with the large gulls. I scrambled over the pebbles onto the beach to try and get some photos but there was no sign of it stood in the same place and it must have took flight without me noticing. Again - as this bird seems to do - it appeared from out of nowhere and started circling the bay and hanging in the breeze. I hadn't learnt how to do flight shots yet with the new camera and so it was a bit hit and miss, but I managed to get the best photo I had taken so far of this mega rare bird.

Royal Tern - Baie des Pecqueries, 10 May 17

Gannet (deceased) - Baie des Pecqueries, 10 May 17 — Gannet (deceased) - Baie des Pecqueries, 10 May 17

Despite these couple of rarities, there were still not a great deal of migrants around - in fact this was one of the worst springs I can remember on patch for general numbers and variety. On 11th May there was a small influx of Spotted Flycatchers and I had one at Pulias and one at Le Guet. Three Painted Ladies at Chouet after school indicated to me that perhaps the birds had finished and it was now time to look for insects.

Arriving back in the last week of April should mean that migration is in full-swing and I should be out looking for rare migrants, but not surprisingly, it wasn't quite like that. The limited free time that was available was mostly migrant-free with few birds present on the patch and elsewhere. It wasn't until 30th April that I saw my first Willow Warbler of the year which is almost obscene. There was a few bits and bats seen on the island but nothing rare enough to dash off for.

One thing I spent time doing was testing out my camera, as I didn't think it was quite working properly, especially the focussing which was ridiculously slow and hardly ever seemed to get things exactly sharp. I only knew this from trying out Mike's camera in Corsica and seeing the difference in speed between his newer model and mine. As a birder, one of the main things that you look for in a camera is speed of focus, catching the fast-moving birds for records shots. After testing my camera using the subjects below I made the decision to buy the newer model. I've only had the camera about 5 years but, as with any technology nowadays, cameras have improved a lot in that time, and the newer model of the Lumix has a lot more features than I currently have. So the photos in this post are the final ones with my present camera.

I did have one good bird in this period. I popped out for lunch to Fort Hommet on 3rd May and as I rounded the corner below the bunker, I flushed an excellent Cuckoo from just in front of me. Not an especially rare species, but I have been watching this stretch of coastline for 15 years or more and this is the first I have ever seen on the headlands - a patch tick. Recently, no doubt because they are getting rarer, I have only recorded Cuckoo a few times - up at Pleinmont and also a single record from the house. I can't remember the last time I heard a singing bird in Guernsey. When we first moved here we definitely used to hear them every now and again.

This bird had the decency to perch up on some twigs for some excellent views (although taking pictures was tricky). What was even more surprising was that I saw it in exactly the same place the next day, eating hairy caterpillars as Cuckoos are wont to do. The island's proper photographers managed to get some superb shots of this bird. You can view pics on the Guernsey Birds website by Dan, Andy and Adrian (here, here and here).

Things started looking a bit brighter on 5th May when the beach at Pulias had 5 White and 3 Yellow Wagtails, 2 Wheatears and 3 Whimbrels all feeding together on the vraic. Hopefully May would have a few top class rarities on offer.

Just A Bird

Just A Bird

Mark Lawlor's Nature Blog

Just A Bird

Friday 12th May 2017

Friday 5th May 2017

Just A Bird