At last: a Rye heron pic

Firstly I would like to say that at the moment, I have been very busy with coursework, exam revision... etc. I am 14 and my GCSE's are mostly next year, but a few more minor ones have already taken place. This is mostly why I haven't been posting very often this month. I just haven't had as much time to gaze out of my bedroom window while the birds come and go. Also, I would like to apologize for not replying to comments very fast - I do read them all. You may notice that the posts will be a little shorter too.

Ah, I'm glad I've got all the depressing stuff out of the way. Now to something much more cheerful- our local park' s wildlife in the morning (again). I was much luckier with my latest trip to the Rye park in terms of bird sightings. It was surprising too as I was there at around 12:00 which meant that it was busy. The Grey Heron isn't a particularly rare bird, but a fantastic one to watch. In the case of the park, there is only one or two that visit, but they are regular visitors. Please forgive the washed-out photos. Considering they are large birds they aren't very tame, so the photos are taken from quite a range.

I also saw some of the usual birds. One of these is the Tufted Duck. They are fantastic to watch and this time I managed to get a close-up picture of one. The males are more striking but I have taken a picture of the female too. They don't demand bread like the Mallards do so they tend to stay away from the path which runs along the river. At a distance these birds look like they are just plain black and white but the pictures I took show some interesting colouring on the back of their necks.

All photos taken at my local park.

My local patch in the mist

In BBC Springwatch, Bill Oddie especially is always urging the viewers to visit their "local patches". Well, this morning, I did. It was great to get out early in the morning too which meant that I could see this morning's mist. The effect was quite stunning, so out came my camera! I loved every minute of it, but was a bit disappointed with the lack of birds I saw. Before I start blithering about what I saw, I had better explain what my local wildlife patch is. It is a large park with a river running through it, and some woodland. It is called the Rye park and is pretty much on my doorstep.

I'm afraid that I only have some swans and ducks to show you today but they are such photogenic birds, so I am quite pleased with the results. On the river before, I have seen Grey Herons very often, and occasionally, Kingfishers too. Thrushes and blackbirds are normally also seen on the grass of the park. But none of these were seen today. The bad visibility probably didn't help, and on another day, it could have been a very different story. The bad visibility changed throughout the day however, as you will find out in my next post.

The Mute Swan is such an elegant bird and they are great to watch. They are a little dominant and the small ducks keep their distance, but they are very funny as they follow you along the path begging for food. I tried using some new camera modes to capture them in a different way today but I think I need some more practice. The swans make such loud noises when they flap their wings too. The swan is such a large bird and they are hard to miss. This is why I am surprised that I found it difficult to see the also large Grey Heron today. The pictures below show some snippets of the swans today. There weren't many different species of ducks out today either, but I did see the Tufted Duck. I posted on Tufted Ducks recently too but I think I got better photos this time. They are less tame than the Mallards, and are smaller too so they are harder to photograph. The males have a shiny look to their plumage and are more striking than the Mallard. My mum does a daily jog through this park and says that there were some colourful ducks yesterday. Just my luck that I saw none of them today :-(

The coots have a brilliant soft look about them, and although they are of a similar colour to the Tufted duck the plumage texture looks very different and they are quite different in how they act. Pictures of the Mallard, Coot and Tufted Duck are below.

I hope that I will be able to visit the Rye again on the weekends and hope that I see a bit more next time. This afternoon was a completely different story, and I have a more successful session of wildlife watching to talk about soon.

All images were taken by me at the Rye park this morning

Swimming Snakes!

I went down to the south coast last Friday and Saturday, and we spent a day around the Titchfield Haven nature reserve. We fed the ducks for a while, off the top of a bridge. They were very hungry, so it was a good job we had quite a lot of duck seed. The image below shows 2 female Tufted Ducks. They are less tame than the greedy Mallards, and took less of the food too. The reserve is marshy, and has a wide variety of birds. Unfortunately, we didn't have the chance to go around properly.

But as we were feeding the ducks, my dad spotted something swimming across the water that I thought was an eel at first (I am new to waterlife). But it was in fact a Grass Snake. My face was probably hysterical when I saw it and was trying to get my camera out frantically. I did just manage to get a picture of it before it swam annoyingly into the reeds. The strange thing was that the ducks followed the snake in the water. Maybe it was safety in numbers! The picture is quite blurred, and you can only just see the snake swimming in the murky water. At the time we didn't know what it was, but after looking in a wildlife book in the visitor centre, we concluded that it was a Grass Snake. If you look carefully, the snake is in the middle of the picture.