Garden Life

I was up early this morning, and before breakfast had analysed the night's nocmig recording. Then it was out into the garden to spot birds and mull over the nocturnal revelations. Barely had I filled my gob with a big swig of coffee when two silent Greylags flew right over the garden and away NE. A mad scramble for the camera, and one brief chance to capture a record shot...

Two Greylags. Trust me. A couple of seconds later they were out of view.

On the old Axe patch I guess Greylag was just about annual, but they are certainly not a regular sight locally. Well, not for me. Two over the garden is unlikely to happen again any time soon. So, a very good start to the day...

Last night I sat out for a while, accompanying my nocmig kit with a super-sharp pair of ears. There was also the red wine, the blue stilton and a few crackers, but the main reason I was there was to listen. After the wine and cheese it seemed appropriate to recline my chair a bit, and rela-a-a-ax. At some point I was conscious of nodding slightly. Not falling asleep you understand, just teetering on the edge. Well, that's what I thought. At 22.58 a Coot flew over, bellowing like a donkey. I know this because it's right there on the recording. Also right there on the recording are the sounds of my regular deep breathing at roughly four-second intervals. On this video you can just about see and hear them at 2, 6, 10, 14 and 19 seconds...

I'm not sure where my nearest local Coots might be. Certainly a few miles away I would imagine. Knowing that Coots occasionally migrate over the garden is just mad. In fact, knowing they can stay airborne for more than about ten seconds is pretty amazing.

Despite the weather changing today, with a switch to a brisk NE breeze and less heat, I was hopeful of some more Red Kite action, and was out in the garden again around midday. With my notebook and biro...

Far more writing than your average seawatch. Far more!

As well as 27 Red Kites (ignore that '28' pencilled in the notebook above) the major highlight was some actual Hobby passage. Four birds (two together and two singles) was a real treat. Also a Peregrine, which is my third or fourth #BWKM0 bird, despite no previous garden records. Notice the Lesser Black-backed Gull? Another garden scarcity. And Beautiful Demoiselle, a female which flew straight through.

Some pics...

Best Hobby photo by a very long way. It was motoring!

I have a million tenth-rate Red Kite images, but will spare you. Instead, here are a couple of invertebrate photos which came out okay...

Large Red Damselflies ovipositing

Momentarily I thought this was a bee, but it is in fact a hoverfly. I had a couple of ID suggestions from Twitter folk, and it would appear to be a Narcissus Bulb Fly (Merodon equestris). I do not keep a hoverfly list and never will, but it's still nice to know what things are isn't it?

With the addition of Greylag I think my #BWKM0 list is now on 58. Obviously I somehow need to get to 60. What will the next two species be? I look forward to spending more time in the garden and finding out.

I'll be out there again shortly. Wide awake and alert, bolt upright in an unreclined chair...

Garden Mega

A forecast of light easterlies and heat was all the temptation I needed in order to dedicate the day to skywatching, and from 10:00 to early evening I did little else. At 10:05 the first Red Kite drifted slowly west. Optimistically I wrote it down in such a way as to leave plenty of space for further Red Kites. Good move. The next went over at 10:55, another at 11:00, and so on...

10:05   1
10:55   1
11:00   1
11:02   2+1
12:03   1
12:06   1
12:22   1
12:25   2
12:37   1

And that was it. 12 Red Kites by lunch time, and then a long gap. Until...

16:20   1
16:29   3
16:33   2
16:58   1

And that really was it. Let me tell you, recording 19 Red Kites over my Bridport garden is a bit special. I know they do this regular thing every spring, heading down to Cornwall and back, but to witness this movement right over our home is rather wonderful, and I feel quite privileged.

Most were quite high, but that didn't stop me practising my 'flight shot' technique on nearly every one.

Judging by our Red Kite hit rate today, and by some of my nocmig results, I think our garden must be quite well situated, geographically speaking. Which is great. But our viewing arrangements are less than ideal. We certainly do not have what you might call a vista - a wide, panoramic view of the surrounding countryside. Although we are fortunate enough to have a garden it is very, very small. I measured it out today. It is nine paces wide, from the neighbour's fence to our garage wall. And from the conservatory to my cabin is five paces. Sitting in this area is like gazing up from the bottom of a bowl, and I feel far more effective, birding-wise, when I stand up and wander about. Which is what I mainly did today.

As well as seeing Red Kites I was also hoping to add one or two species to my #BWKM0 list. Song Thrush and Dunnock are big gaps, so I was chuffed to see a Dunnock early on today. Also a Linnet flew over, and a brief and distant Hobby this afternoon. However, the fourth addition to the #BWKM0 list was as unexpected as they get...

After the first Red Kite this morning I posted this tweet...

By 'bigger prize' I was thinking raptor of course. Honey Buzzard, Black Kite, that kind of thing. There have been one or two about elsewhere. Anyway, at 14:10 I spied the third Sparrowhawk of the day and debated trying for a photo. But no, it was a bit distant, and clearly going away, so I didn't bother. At that moment a bird flew virtually overhead from behind me, at roughly treetop height. Its raptor-ish jizz didn't fool me for more than a nanosecond. It was a Cuckoo! Getting the bins on it straight away I had a cracking view from below, and could see the graduated tail feathers, each neatly tipped with a white blob. It was heading away fast, and my efforts to fire up the camera and grab a shot proved futile. But wow! Just wow! In my 17 years in E Devon and W Dorset this is only the third spring Cuckoo I have actually clapped eyes on, and I've heard no more than about three others. To be honest, today a Black Kite would have been less surprising!

My #BWKM0 list now stands at 57.

An obliging Buzzard this afternoon.

We have a small raised pond in the garden which attracts a few bits and bobs. Unfortunately a Broad-bodied Chaser flew through and was not attracted one bit, but this pair of Large Red Damselflies felt differently...

Resistance Training

Every time I've been for a decent walk lately, I've worn boots. Usually the grass is wet, and they seem the sensible option...

These boots were made for...er...walking.

Trouble is, the monsters weigh almost 1kg apiece. That's like heading off down the road with a bag of sugar strapped to each foot. No wonder my hip flexors wind up a bit sore, swinging those babies forward every stride. Anyway, today I didn't go out until quite late. The sunshine had me in shorts and a tired old pair of Merrell trainers, at half the weight. I was off like a rocket, and far less fatigued. It was like swapping the steel winter bike for the lighweight summer job. Brilliant!

Athletes would call this resistance training. Loosely defined, it applies to any exercise performed against a resistance (often a weight) and is designed to build muscular strength and endurance. The principle is that you make things intentionally hard for yourself, in order to make everything feel so much easier when the resistance is no longer present.

So let's take the principle and apply it to birding.

For most of us the spring birding has been pretty slow. The lockdown restrictions are like a massive extra weight on the barbell, like trying to climb the Col du Galibier on a Boris Bike. The birding version of resistance training. Have there been any benefits though? Benefits that will become evident when the restrictions are eased?

Speaking personally, yes, I think so. I've spent a lot of time looking at the sky. I've got good at it, certainly much better than I was. I have come to know the look of a uniformly blue, utterly birdless expanse. The moment - the very instant - that a bird intrudes upon it, it is nailed. Nailed. So yes, I've got brilliant at watching the infinitely empty bloomin' sky.

Nocmig is like a resistance training regime in itself. If you want to improve your ability to recognise bird calls, nocmig is like the weights-machine from hell. Take your usual birdy squeaks, chips, prrrts and yips, remove all context (like habitat, or handily-passing actual bird) and there you have it: a bird-call training mega work-out.

Like last night...

An interesting little squiggle on the spectrogram, and even more so when I listened to it. See if you can work out what it is. I'm going to give you a big fat clue: it's a wader.

So, I listened to it and thought to myself, 'Hmmm, that's obviously a passerine, but I've no idea which one.' And away I went, steaming off down some hopeless blind alley. Assuming you've listened to it, knowing it's a wader, chances are that you will have got it. If you are familiar with the call of Common Sandpiper, that is. Perhaps you're thinking how obvious it is, and how useless that NQS bloke is, and no doubt you are correct. I am really bad at this.

Anyway, Common Sand over my garden! What! Fantastic! Also a flock of Whimbrel that was audible for more than a minute!

I should mention that today's walk was very poor for birds. The only pukka migrant I encountered was a single Wheatear. This was nice though...

First Small Heath of the year.

All the while I was gliding silkily along in my gossamer shoes, I was thinking that it looked a brilliant day for raptors, and ever-conscious that much of UK airspace has lately been filled with Black Kites, Honey Buzzards and stupidly-rare, dark-morph Montagu's Harriers. But not a single interesting raptor did I see.

However, I'd been home about five minutes and a Red Kite drifted over. And then two more. Then three together. Then five together! By the end of a 20-25 minute spell, at least 13 had gone W, and shortly afterwards a 14th popped up above the trees to our east, eating something. It reappeared later, but didn't drift W like the others had. A Red Kite bonanza!

Any excuse for Red Kite photos...

A couple of silhouetted birds...

...and a slightly better lit one

Clutching something rather meaty-looking...

...and tucking in.

Red Kites are no longer the novely they once were, but they are always going to be a very welcome sight I think. Black versions will of course be a very, very welcome sight.

Rainy-Day Writing

It is raining right now, and I'm in my little man cave listening to the pitter-patter on the roof. In a way the sound of rain is pleasant when you're all snuggly-warm and curled up indoors, but right now I'm not getting that vibe. Quite the opposite...

The coronavirus lockdown scenario gets to me sometimes. In selfish moments it's easy to focus on the things I miss. Driving to my favourite birding spots and mooching about at will. Touching gate latches with my bare hands, not for a moment concerned they might be smeared with deadly things. Seawatching. Yes, seawatching. Sitting on my fat backside, hunched over my scope, disgusted that yet another promising wind has produced just five Gannets and a Guillemot.

And then I remember that my family is all well. Because of Covid-19, other people are missing things far less trivial. Uncles, aunts, mums, husbands, children...

Publishing regular NQS posts has been a nice distraction from life's realities, so apologies for the gloomy start to this one. Clearly I need to avoid rainy-day writing just now.

Proper seawatching may be out of the question, but I can easily walk to the sea, and occasionally do. I pass hardly anyone en route, and realise I am extremely fortunate to have it so accessible. Mostly I've done this walk very early in the morning, but yesterday went in the afternoon. Some photographic highlights...

Distant Wheatears on a wall. Standard views!

Wheatears have been a feature of my spring this year. Perhaps the feature. They are seemingly the only migrant evident in any numbers (14 or 15 yesterday) and can be extremely photogenic.

Quite close Wheatear on a wall. Not standard views!

This next one was my favourite yesterday. Never close, but a right character. Don't think I've ever seen a bird stand so rigidly upright that it looks in danger of falling over backwards! Plumage not 'rusty' enough to label as classic Greenland type, but who knows?

Straight after this little stunner I finally caught up with a bird which I have seen as a brief 'probable' twice so far this spring, and can at last label 'definite'...

Hobby. Not hanging about.

I'm not sure how far away that Hobby was, but some 2-300m at least I would guess. It was slightly bigger than a dot. At 800mm equivalent zoom, it took about four attempts before the camera would lock on to it, and when it did I fired off a single burst of seven frames. Here's the original image size...

I think the camera did pretty well to manage in-focus shots of something so small and distant and rapid. Again, it illustrates how useful it might be if I'm ever presented with a somewhat rarer fly-by one day.

A walk is not all birds of course. There is simple fresh air, and scenery, and creaky knees. In addition, there are other creatures...

Handsome Roe buck in tolerant mood. Briefly.

I am aware of butterflies, hoverflies and other small things when I'm out and about, but am rarely actively looking for them (plants even less). So when it comes to getting noticed, I'm afraid the onus is on them. Like this beetle, which was so blatently in-your-face that even I couldn't miss it...

Thanks to helpful folk on Twitter I now know this is an Alder Leaf Beetle Agelastica alni. Google tells me it is a recent colonist. My eyes tell me it is an unbelievably shiny blue.

Well, I did reach the sea yesterday, and four Whimbrel flew past, very close in. The light was awful, but the resulting image I nevertheless find quite appealing...

Slightly 'arty' Whimbrel photo

The rain has stopped now, so I ought to cheer up a bit. But before I do, here's something which made me want to weep...

A few days ago there was a 'slurry spill' at a farm close to the Coly Valley, not far from where I used to live in Seaton. The little stream into which this unfortunate 'spill' discharged flows into the River Coly, which in turn flows into the River Axe. According to the scant reportage of this calamitous event, 'hundreds' of fish were killed. That'll be the tip of the iceberg...

Spill. Interesting word. Oops, I've spilled some red wine! It's made a terrible mark on my blandly neutral carpet! Never mind, I'll Google how to remedy that.

Or...

Oops, I've spilled many, many tonnes of liquid raw sewage into a fragile and already-beleaguered ecosystem! Never mind, I'll...er...I'll...er...

Most of the farming round here is dairy. I'm not going to make any comment about that, but I will say this. I have loved rivers since, as a small boy, I was made aware of the wonderful creatures they contain. Not just the fish, but everything, big and small. And throughout my life I've seen them suffer. I know there are happy stories out there, but mainly with rivers it is a tale of gloom, neglect and criminal apathy. It makes me very sad.

Sorry about that, dear readers, but writing this post was for some strange reason a necessity.

Nikon P900 - the First Six Months

Back in December last year I wrote a post entitled Nikon P900 - Initial Steps, designed to help non-photographer type birders get to grips with the Nikon Coolpix P900, a camera which many of us are employing to enhance our birding. At the time I'd owned one for a couple of months, found some settings which worked okay for me, and simply shared that info in case anyone else found it useful. Indirectly I was reminded today that I ought to write an update, because I've moved on a little bit since then. Nothing major, but a few tweaks have now made the camera more versatile, and even better suited to my needs. If that sounds useful, read on...

So, what are my needs? What do I want from this camera?

1. If I find a good bird, I want at least what you might call record shots.
2. If a nice photographic opportunity presents itself (obliging bird, good light, etc) ideally I want better than record shots. A few really nice photos now and then would be great.
3. I want a reasonable chance of getting flight shots.

I like to illustrate NQS with nice pics, so I've been using the camera on almost every outing. What follows is based upon that experience, and I can honestly say that the settings I use get the best results of which I am currently capable, and the evidence is scattered through the last umpteen posts in this blog. I'm sure a good photographer with decent skill and a critical eye would do much better than me, but largely I am very happy with results so far.

Right then, here is the nitty gritty...



'U' Mode
Four months ago I didn't understand what 'U' mode did. I do now. It is massively useful, as will hopefully become clear...

For almost all my shooting I use the exact same settings, and when I wrote 'Initial Steps' I had those settings installed in 'A' Mode. Here they are, copied from that post, except for a couple of more recent tweaks which I've explained in italics. [PS. The reason for the highlighting becomes obvious later]

   Image Quality - FINE
   Image size - 16M (4608x3456)
   Picture Control - Standard (with default values)
   White Balance - Auto1
   Metering - Spot
   Continuous - Single
   ISO Sensitivity - AUTO
[Updated from 'ISO Auto 400' - I've mostly found that photos in poor light, when the camera assigns an ISO higher than 400, are not as bad as I thought they would be. Definitely more noisy (grainy) than ISO 400 or less, but not a show-stopper. That said, on a really gloomy day I can always change it again if I feel the need, and sacrifice shutter speed.]
   Exposure bracketing - OFF
   AF area mode - Manual (spot)
   Autofocus mode - AF-F
   Flash exp. comp. - 0.0
   Noise reduction filter - NR- (low)
   Active D-Lighting - OFF
   Multiple exposure - OFF
   Zoom memory - ON (and I've set 800, 1200, 1600 and 2000)
[I've added 300 and 500 to this lot, because 800 is sometimes way too much initial zoom.]  
   Startup zoom position - 50
   M exposure preview - OFF

So here's the procedure...

1. Turn the mode dial to 'A'
2. Input the settings as above.
3. This is the killer step. As you scroll through the menu you will have noticed 'Save user settings'. Highlight it and press OK. Your settings are now magically saved in a memory. A memory which you access by turning the mode dial to 'U'.
4. Turn the mode dial to 'U'.
5. Take photos.

In other words, 'U' becomes a saved version of 'A'. So 'U' is now an 'Aperture Priority' mode, with all your favourite settings attached. In practice I usually just turn the aperture to as small a number as possible and fire away. Unless I want a flight shot...



Flight Shots
For flight shots I am using 'S' mode (Shutter Priority) and generally set a speed of 1/500 sec, though I'll go a bit faster if the light is good, slower if poor. The settings are as above, except for two fundamental differences...

   Continuous - Continuous H
[This a high speed burst of up to something like ten shots. The camera then takes a few seconds to process them before it's ready for another go, so you might only get one chance at a fly-by. Though you can fire off a shorter burst of three or four at a time, which process a bit quicker. I highly recommend this rather than one shot at a time.]
   AF area mode - Target finding AF
[This locks on to a flying bird far better than the 'Manual (spot)' setting used for birds on the deck.]

Now here's the thing. Both the above settings, once input, will apply to both 'S' and 'A' modes (also 'P' and 'M' - all four modes are linked). For certain parameters the camera does not allow for these modes to have independant settings. Until I learned that 'U' mode is totally separate, and locked, I was cursing this fact, because I only wanted high-speed burst shooting and target finding AF for flight shots, nothing else. Well, by utilising 'U' mode that becomes possible.

Basically I now use just those two modes, each with independant settings - 'U' for everyday stuff, and 'S' for flight shots. I hope that makes sense! Anyway, I'm not going to say anything further about flight shots, but will instead point you towards this excellent article (with thanks to Jeff Hazell for telling me about it):

P900 and P610 Birds in Flight method

I was chuffed to learn that what the writer recommends was pretty much what I had discovered for myself, but he explains it much better than I could. There are some great tips and insight in this article. Well worth studying.

Incidentally, getting flight shots is hard, and I am not very good at it. Locking onto a bird and panning with it is undoubtedly a skill. A skill which I have not mastered. I need to practice, practice, practice!



Video
I'm just going to mention one further thing. Simply pressing the red 'record' button has produced some terrific video. Among other things it clinched the ID of a Caspian Gull which I would otherwise have struggled to document convincingly, and gave me some gripping footage of the Axe American Herring Gull. It is a feature of the camera that I neglect badly, and if I ever find a nice rarity I do hope I remember to press that button at some stage.

As illustrated in yesterday's post, the video function is great for capturing sound too. And a tip for anyone who uses it for such: zoom the lens a bit, even if you can't actually see the bird. Doing this turns the microphone into a mini shotgun mic, focusing in on (and therefore highlighting) the sound you want, and minimising everything else.

I'm no photographer, so a camera which can give me this, hand-held at full 2000mm optical zoom, is a-a-a-alright.

On This Date...

After a few years of doldrums, this very date in 2017 provided the catalyst that got some fizz back into my enthusiasm for birding. Idly - and not very attentively - strolling along the coast between Burton Bradstock and Cogden, I inadvertantly flushed this beauty...

Oof! What a flight shot! (photo by Mike Morse)

This wonderful Hoopoe went on to do the right thing and stuck around long enough that a few other local birders got to see it. I am a big fan of spring birding, and finding that Hoopoe kind of epitomises it for me - the possibility that any second now you're going to be ambushed by some garish, colourful job that takes your breath away. Super-tricky brown things are in the minority. Love it!

This spring, unfortunately, stuff like this is very unlikely to happen to me. It might, but based on the heavily-pruned list of birdy places I can visit currently...probably not. Wheatears can happen, yes, and I've had a single Whinchat, but I still haven't seen my longed-for Redstart. Or Yellow Wagtail. Or very much else really. And until this morning, I thought I'd had my chips with Grasshopper Warbler too. But not quite...

I didn't see it, but, like a nakedly-nocmigged Nightjar, you can get ample jollies from the noise alone.

Talking of nocmig...

Last night I heard absolutely nothing by the time I went indoors around 23:00, but the recording revealed several night-time visitors: Whimbrel x4, a very vocal Coot (only my third), a Barn Owl, Moorhen, Oystercatcher, and my first Fox. There were also two or three possible-this-or-that kind of occurrences too, which is all part of the charm. They are the little puzzles that you either seek help with immediately or, if you think it's something you can likely solve unaided with a bit more experience, tuck away for a later date.

Finally, a few snaps...

Not quite as obliging (or as well lit!) as the Lesser Whitethroat I met just recently, this Whitethroat was likewise giving it some welly though...

It is pretty obvious that Stonechats are specifically designed to perch on twigs and pose...

So here we are in May. Are the Wheatears mainly looking a bit different now? I think so...

Early-morning sun+stone wall+female Wheatear = warm glow

This one hopped out from behind a wall, froze for exactly one photo, and then bolted for the horizon.

May 2nd might not have produced as spectacular a bird as 2017's Hoopoe, but I'm a bit happier with the photos I get these days.

On this date... The Three Pixels of Happiness, May 2nd, 2017

In Which the Garden's List Grows

After bleating on yesterday about my Common Scoter woes, last night I received a belated invitation to the party. At 21:55 one or more Common Scoter went overhead, making their very weird noise. On Twitter today it was likened to the squeaky sound that the action of cleaning glass can produce, and to...er...Roger Whittaker. You decide...

[Ignore the high-pitched squeaks at 5.5kHz - the wind caused some random object to do that intermittently all night]

I can safely say that 21:55 is bang in the middle of the usual naked nocmig vigil, and no doubt the Scoter was/were perfectly audible. Unfortunately a shower of rain about ten minutes earlier had driven me indoors for the night. Very annoying.

And at 23:10 this squealing creature made its gangly way across the night sky...

It's the garden's first Water Rail. Not mine, just the garden's.

And finally, at 23:16, a squadron of Oystercatchers came through. It all sounds very bog standard Oystercatchery until that excellent little flourish right at the end, which to my knowledge I've never heard them do. Very cool.

Doing this nocmig stuff really makes you listen to what you've recorded, and listen properly, with a bit of focus. It certainly is helping me to appreciate bird vocalisations more than I used to, and has been worth the trouble for that benefit alone. My list, the garden's list...who cares? Nocmig is just brilliant!