Park Life

Urban parks offer an oasis for wildlife amongst the concrete sprawl of the town and cities. There is a further advantage for the wildlife photographer in that many of birds and mammals are accustomed to people and can therefore be approached relatively easily. I often take a short walk in the early evening, without the camera, through my local park. Often I have watched various birds as I have wandered through but until recently have not visited with camera. To all those thinking of dashing over to the local park with the camera, please consider a couple of points. Some parks may have restrictions on photography and others may not be safe to walk around with a camera! Also when taking photos in a public space, people may take offence to a long lens appearing to point in their direction. So an approach that is sensitive to others and my subject is always the order of day. I always adopt a very early start when the park is quiet but busy with wildlife.

In my local park there are a good number of our largest song bird, the Mistle Thrush. Often difficult to approach, these park birds are relatively confiding.

It is great to watch their 'concentration' as they listen for worms...

and which rarely fails.

The must have bred very early this year as the first brood had already fledged.

Collared Doves are common in the park and no doubt some of the same birds that visit my back garden occasionally.

A bonus in the shape of Great Spotted Woodpecker nest. This is the female bringing back a beakful of aphids to feed the recently hatched young.

Pigeons and Doves

I have been getting a few pigeon and dove shots during January and so thought I would combine them in to a post. I guess they are a group of birds that does not receive a great deal of attention due to being a common sight.

Starting with the largest UK species the Wood Pigeon taken in some very gloomy conditions.

I often use feral pigeons for practicing my flight photography and what may seem easy actually presents quite a challenge. Here on with the 'landing gear' down.
and a less common coloured one flying past.

I currently have 6 collared doves regularly visiting the backgarden and its good to see some activitiy with it being generally quite for birds there at the moment.Moving over to local woodland, I took a trip out yesterday hoping to get some stock dove photographs. I managed a couple but feel the need to return to get some more.

Doves and thrush

I came across a pair of collared dove a couple of days back who sat very patiently while they were photographed.

As they were being so patient I moved in closer on them both..

A large group of Mistle Thrush were moving around an alternating between the groundand a small rowan tree carrying fresh berriesQuite a beakful.

Dove from above

A pair of collared doves have been regularly visiting the garden for years, particularly during the summer months so I thought I would take a few shots of them yesterday evening. They seem to be getting more and more inquisitive and I am sure one night one will come through the back door into the kitchen.

Out the Back Door

The weather has continued to be poor so to keep the shutter finger exercised I have been taking a few shots in the back garden from the shelter of the kitchen. This Wood Pigeon photograph sums up the recent weather.

Other current visitors at the moment are a pair of Collared Doves which seem quite aggressive towards all other pigeons that come into the garden.

There are large numbers of young birds from this year's broods now visiting the garden with the main two species being goldfinch.

and in the last few days some young blue tits.

Saturday morning showers

After the deluge of rain of this last week, I decided to head out yesterday morning for a couple of hours. I nearly did not go as the light was not really very good and it was still raining but needed to get out with the camera. Having said that I did not come home with many shots as I spent a fair amount of time trying to get some shots of reed warbler but they had other ideas. So I ended up with..

A goldfinch gathering nesting material

A Greenfinch
and a male LinnetMeanwhile in my back garden at home the numbers of this years young goldfinch are steadily increasing.and the Collared doves seem quite aggressive at the moment and chasing away a number of other birds

I also caught sight of another very small new visitor to the garden which has so far escaped the attentions of the neighbours cats.

Out the back door

As the weather has not been good this week, as well as being very busy, my opportunities to get out have been a bit bit sparse this week. However, the back garden is staying busy with plenty of birds coming in including the first broods of this year's young. For some birds I can just shoot from the back door off the kitchen

Young blackbird

A new House sparrow from the nest in the roof to the growing flock.The goldfinches are also increasing in numbers.

The extra birds arriving means that there is not enough room on the feeder which increases the chances of me getting some shooting opportunities.

Another recent arrival this week, that have been absent for a while, is the collared dove. There are a lot of colourful shrubs growing well in the garden at the moment, with all the rain, which is providing some unusual coloured backgrounds.

Where there is water..

I always think a good tactic for getting photographs of birds in hot countries is to head for places of water, as something will turn up before long...

On the walk down to town I came across this pigeon or should I say rock dove which is the nearest I have found to a wild looking bird.

I found a square in the old part of Puerto de la Cruz with a fountain and sure enough some birds were visiting. A bird which frequently visits my garden back home, the Collared Dove

However of more interest to me were the Spanish Sparrow as I have not seen or photographed these before. Female amongst the flower beds.

but the males put on a better display

especially when they decided to take an afternoon shower in the fountain.

and to finish off this set a Grey Heron that I came across in a park pool.