Archived & Upcoming Images of the Day
Pheasants are hardly 'nimble', but they can make it onto perches more readily that one might think. We caught images like this several times over a week.
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At least some of our pheasants spend the night high up in evergreen
trees, often landing on a deciduous tree branch and walking along it into
the overlapping conifer.
We have never managed photograph an arrival but one evening in
March 2009 we heard a noise in a tree above a camera kit we were servicing
and using flash caught this female not as well hidden as others in the tree.
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Our current dominant male pheasant not even having to practice looking glorious.
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The male pheasant 'guarding' the female.
Well guarding his 'oats' anyway!
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This male chaffinch arrives after many times being repelled by a robin, but finds that only a few crumbs are left.
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The male Chaffinches continue their battle for access to the peanut feeder even in the snow. Meanwhile the Great Tit makes a beeline for the temporarily unguarded peanut feeder!
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An occasional view of 2 recently re-appeared Little Egrets delights us. This is an accurate montage of one of them at about 7 fpsBR What a beautiful pristine bird against the drab tones of a murky day!
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This male chaffinch is threatening a Great Spotted Woodpecker at the left, but the Woodpecker was not impressed
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An in-flight squabble between a male chaffinch and a Tree Sparrow maneuvering to use it's claws.
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Fox!
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A magpie caught at the moment of landing with the wing feathers and tail catching the flashlight very attractively
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A Tree Sparrow getting an unpleasant greeting from the arriving Robin.
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A Blue tit ABOUT to get an unpleasant greeting from the arriving Robin?
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Our dominant male pheasant ...
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One of our dominant male pheasants 'wives' at identical crop and scale.
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A flurry of subtle grey feathers as a collared dove flies over the log
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A Hare lolloping about in the harvested wheat field to our south. We don't know the time gap between the top images and the rest, but the rest are at about 7 fps of an unhurried 'walking' gait.
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We are aware of just this visit from the Barn owl this week. Oh how WE want a neck that can turn 180 degrees, but then the birds huge eyes are fixed so it needs this movement to look about.
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A fixed stare at the ground suggests that the Barn Owl has heard some movement on the ground.
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You think YOU get cold feet?
Birds have heat exchangers at the top of their legs and expect
their legs to get very cold so they probably don't notice.
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Rain removed the snow cover in just a few hours. What a relief from the endless white - an antarctic camp would not suit us at all, but then you hear of people going mad in such environments, so perhaps we are not alone
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A Magpie hunting for food under the snow on the log.
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Whee!
For some reason we have started getting a few of these
reasonably focussed face-on shots of leaping mice.
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"Hey - I can leap as well!"
A vole demonstrates that it is not only Fieldmice (Wood Mice) can leap.
We don't want to tell the vole that we only give the mark 3/10
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Twee or what?
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In a pasture to the South around midday we saw this pair of hares cavorting
about. The pairs may seem to be in the wrong sequence but are correct top
to bottom - we first saw them mating, then running about.
We watched for a while hoping for a 'boxing match' but they ran around a
bit and then settled to feeding.
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The Tawny Owl made its first visit for many weeks to the kitchen feeder perch, as usual avoiding the sense beam by landing at the other side. Spotted on CCTV, a dash in the dark to the camera captured this portrait.
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The next 3 images after the first included one just as the bird left. This last was pure chance - the human eye can't see anything out of the window.
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We are not sure what the male pheasant in the foreground is up to (except maybe displaying to the female in the background), but it gives an opportunity to examine the incredibly intricate plumage at the 'back'. Look at the shapes, colours & textures normally hidden.
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We are seeing these 2 robins tolerating each other regularly at this site. Most probably they are nearby territory holding birds accepting each other ready for breeding.
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Contrails are not our favourite sky adornment.
But here the rising sun at least made them a pretty colour for a few minutes
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An elegant female chaffinch flying in to pick over the remains of food put out for the wildlife on the stump.
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We love the 'this whole feeder is mine' with the section around the other side occupied by the wonderful tail.
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Rabbit standing guard over remains of a carrot?
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The (presumably same) Barn Owl was spotted on the CCTV visiting 5 times in 4 days, twice for less than a minute before diving down. This set of images is from one of the visits.
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The (presumably same) Barn Owl was spotted on the CCTV visiting 5 times in 4 days, twice for less than a minute before diving down. This set of images is from one of the visits.
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Mrs. Blackbird elegantly poised.
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Mr. Blackbird at a ground level site about 10 metres from the tree-stump
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2 days apart, different views of probably the same Collared Dove. We have a pair spending a lot of time together in the conifer whose thick trunk is the wide black vertical near the left edge.
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Grey Squirrels are normally so elegant, but here we catch one off-guard enjoying an ecstatic scratch.
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Grey Squirrels are normally so elegant, but here we catch one starting the 1.5 metre drop to the ground.
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A pair of Little Egrets are making occasional forays where we can see them. This one flew by to the north - this is an accurate montage.
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This Magpie is out just after a fresh fall of snow. The soft powder sticks to many bird's beaks in this quite funny way.
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