Cromer Zoo

My holiday last week in Norfolk is now a dim and distant memory having returned to heavy workload in the office. While away we visited the new small zoo at Cromer which was quite interesting as it held a number of animals that I have seen before. The light was not great but some of the enclosures were reasonable for getting some photographs after a bit of careful positioning.

Zoos generate a lot of mixed feelings and of course everyone would ideally like to see animals running, flying or swimming free and wild. My view is that not only do they undertake very important conservation work and are making great steps for improving the enclosures for the animals but also they offer the chance for the public to get a glimpse of the wonderful diversity of this planet which they would not normally get to see. As a bonus they also provide a good practice ground for the photographer.

The zoo at Cromer is known as the 'Amazona Zoo' so it seems appropriate to start this post with an Amazon Parrot

The zoo held a couple of owls. The problem will photographing owls in zoos is that the visit in the daytime coincides with when they want to sleep, like this burrowing owl, and so they don't tend to make great subjects for the camera.

There was a small tropical house which held some caimen but the light in there was even worse than it was outside.

I then turned my attention to some mammals. There was a heap of slightly dejected looking spider monkeys.

The perennial zoo favourite in the shape of Geoffrey's Marmoset

There were some interesting cats that you do not often see in the zoo including puma and ocelot and which I have not put in front of the camera lens before, although unfortunately the enclosure of the latter was just not suitable for getting any photographs, particularly when combined with the low light levels and very active cats. The big cats all looked to be in real great condition.

Just a small warning before the next photograph as it shows graphic content of a puma feeding on a rabbit. Nature is not always attractive when predator is consuming prey but I think you will agree the puma is a wonderful looking animal.

I occasionally receive emails asking how I manage to get photographs in zoo where there is no mesh showing and it looks like you are inside the enclosure. This is achieved by a combination of three factors. Firstly careful positioning as you ideally want to get the camera as close to the mesh as possible and the animal at some distance away in the enclosure. Incidental the smaller the mesh size the more difficult it is to overcome. Secondly you need a lens of reasonable focal length as this creates a shallower depth of field (these shots were taken with a 300mm lens which is probably the minimum you can get away with). Thirdly you need to open the lens aperture right up (F4 in the case of my 300mm). The result of all this is that it puts the mesh so far out of focus that it effectively disappears as can be seen in the jaguar photograph.

To finish off I have noticed on my recent zoo trips that big cats start licking their lips when they see me which is a bit concerning!

From North to South

The Northern Wheatear are currently making their long journey back southward towards Africa for the winter. Small groups of birds can be found temporarily pausing along the scrub and pasture areas behind the local coast, although finding them is more a question of luck in being there at the right time as some are passing through. I was fortunate to recently locate a group of 8 birds.

The autumn passage birds have a 'softer' look about them as the males have lost their bold markings of the spring and all the take on an appealing warm apricot colour. These returning wheatear also seem much more approachable than those found in the spring and were typically perching along the fence line of a paddock.

A few were also present on the large boulders of the local sea defences which is the closest similar habitat they will find around here to their rocky upland breeding grounds.

The birds were busy hopping down from the fence posts on the a gravel path to feed on insects to fuel their long journey.

However, the heat haze coming off the path on the warm early autumn day was playing havoc with focusing as usual. This bird was having a battle trying to subdue a large beetle in had found.

Wishing them all a safe onward journey and I look foward to their return with their spring colours in the middle of March.

On TV Again....

Sorry about the lack of updates but I have been away on holiday in Norfolk during this last week. I managed a few photos whilst there despite very limited camera time which should appear on here once I get round to processing them.

Just a quick note to let you know that I should be appearing on BBC Countryfile tomorrow, Sunday 20th September on BBC 1 at 7pm. Thats assuming I didn't end up on the 'cutting room' floor!

Update.... here is a link to the show which will be available on BBC iplayer for the next 7 days

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00mwtvz/Countryfile_20_09_2009/

Project J Update

Regular readers will know that earlier in the year I started a mini project to try and get some Jay flight photos. However, I never reported back as the best laid plans fell flat when the birds disappeared to go off to breed. This was a shame I was just starting to get some photos but only kept the two below as they were proving very tricky and I was not achieving the shots I wanted.

Almost a flight photo

Not being the type of person that gives up easily I decided to resurrect the project. However, I have already decided that I have probably started too soon as there is still a good supply of natural food around to tempt the jays away from where I want them. So the project will probably be paused briefly until the late autumn now. Of course some magpies put in appearance and so I decided to use them for practice to refine the camera technique for the jays ahead, hopefully!

Some of the magpies are still not looking at their best as they are in moult. AS you can see this one is a slightly lacking the full compliment of feathers around the head.

This bird has completed its moult and if you can get them at the right angle to the light then the blue, greens and purples really start to shine.

A further update of Project J will appear in the future and hopefully with some photos to show for my efforts.

Competition Win

I recently entered a photography competition run by the North Wales Daily Post in conjunction with Airbus. The theme of the competition was to submit a photo that represented the biodiversity of North Wales. As I have spent quite a bit of time in North Wales photographing the woodland summer migrants that are typical of the sessile oakwoods of the area, I thought it worth entering. The choice of which photograph to enter was quite difficult and fell between pied flycatcher, wood warbler and common redstart. I settled on a Common Redstart on a lichen covered branch which is typical of these oakwoods. The photograph won the competition and part of the prize is that the image appears within the exhibition of Joel Sartore, a National Geographic Photographer, that has just opened in Llanberis. It makes all those hours of quiet waiting even more worthwhile.

Here is the winning photo.

Hare Tonic


During August as the bird photography can be a little on the quiet side I thought it time have a break from the birds and to catch up with the hares again. They provide a great diversion and refreshing tonic from the bird photography and always entertaining and fun to photograph. I am occasionally sent emails asking how to go about photographing these enigmatic animals and my first bit of advice is to get a good alarm clock as an early start will provide the best chance of finding them.
Back-lit against the rising sun



They can often be quiet in the early part of the day and may be found just standing around, sometimes warming themselves in the sun and at other times grooming themselves or just quietly feeding.
I thought I was suffering from early morning blurry double vision when I first spotted these two.


It often does not take them long to start getting up to some of their usual 'mad' hare antics. This can be just having a personal odd moment ...


.....to the typical chasing round of the females by the males.


To finish the post, the first leveret I have seen this year. Always good to see some of these new mini-hares which hopefully will provide many more photos in the years to come.

Dunlin Everywhere

I recently had an enjoyable but relatively short session with a large flock of Dunlin. The numbers of these birds seemed to have started building early this year with good numbers around locally already. It was a well a well timed visit as the ebbing tide had just exposed a mud bank and the birds were busy feeding on it. As usual with waders the usual approach of sitting away and still at distance and hoping they will come to you work well, and at one point I had several birds feeding with a few feet of my position.

Some of the birds still showed remnants of their summer plumage.

These birds never stay still for a moment when they are feeding and given their small size makes them quite a tricky target.

Looking around for food in the small puddles left on the shore.

If that approach doesn't work then its time for them to get the beak muddy......

.....with the occasional stop to clean off the excess

As a bonus there were a couple of Ringed Plover mixed in amongst the chaos of the Dunlin flock and I was fortunate to have this one pause briefly close by.

Return of the Turnstones

Over the last three or four weeks the Turnstones have start returning from their northern breeding grounds. It seems to be quite an early a return to me but may be its something I have just not really noticed in previous years. From a photography point of view the early returning birds offer an opportunity to capture some birds in their attractive summer plumage. One point of note is that I have found these early returners to be much less approachable than the usually fairly confiding turnstones I encounter through the winter. Here are a small selection of photos taken on the local coast since their return.

When I first spotted this bird at distance I could not quite work out what species it was from the pale colouring but on closer inspection it turned out to be a young bird.

and one more of these technicolour beachcombers..

Of course the turnstones are not the only waders that have been heading back here with good numbers of dunlin and redshank starting to arrive but that can they wait until the next post.

Grey and White

I had a brief session down on the local coast recently in a rare moment of summer sunshine. The jet stream slipping south this year has in the last few weeks made for some less than idea photo conditions with streams of clouds coming in from the west and only brief glimpses of sunlight coinciding with my free time.

The peninsula where I live is subject to a very large tidal range which can be up to about 10 metres. The accompanying currents carve channels through the shifting sand beds. These channels create good hunting grounds for herons and more recently Little egrets on an ebbing tide. Neither of these birds are particularly easy to approach in the absence of cover and so I decided to quietly settle in amongst the rocks of a groyne to see what came my way.

First visitor was a grey heron flying in across the sand banks.

Photographing the birds coming in across the sand has some advantages as the reflected light provides some under lighting to the subject.

Another bird coming into land. The pools can on occasions attract quite large numbers of herons.

I did have one bird coming up close stalking fish along the edge and I was waiting to move to the right of my position to get a better angle to the light but a group of kids with parents appeared putting all the birds to flight and the session to an end. However, before this one of three Little Egrets present came strolling purposely past me.

As usual on the look out for an easy fish meal

My last view of the egrets as they too where sent scattering skyward by the arrival of the paddling kids.

Taking Terns

I could never get bored of photographing terns. They are very interesting birds that form some great postures when stood and always graceful and elegant in flight. Earlier this year I joined up to a local nature reserve which provides a temporary summer home to large numbers of terns particularly Common Terns.

So I recently paid a couple of visits to the reserve with the specific goal of photographing some of the birds before they dispersed southward.

It really is an excellent place for photographing the birds as the opportunities to puts birds in front of the lens from one of the hides is so numerous. They form some interesting postures when they land in display to other passing birds.

What I was really after was some good flight photos but was this required a morning visit with a south-easterly to get the birds coming in the right direction which never really happened. The sun was also typically fleeting as it has been recently. I still managed some flight photos but not the image I have in my head. I admit I messed quite a few flight photos up with ends of wings out of the frame. Then again when you see the length of the wings that comes as no great surprise!

However, a few flight photos did come my way...

The birds are already starting to disperse from the reserve so I will probably leave them for now but am already planning for a mini-project with them next year although hopefully on a day when conditions are perfect.