"Swans Awake" - very last ones of Whooper Swans - promise!

Just found these last few Whooper Swan images for posting - promise no more after that!   I wasn't expecting the eye of a Whooper Swan to be as pale as that in the final image.

Welney "Swans Awake" - some favourites

This may be the last posting from this wonderful early morning trip and includes what I think might be my favourite images.    I know they look as though they are printed on blotting paper but I'm not troubled by that.   The effect adds atmosphere which is reminiscent of the special morning and I love the subtle colours as more and more light caught the Whooper Swans as they flew off to feed on the local fields.   I can't help wondering if the birds do touch one another when flying in such close formation.   It looks possible!

Moonlight at Welney - 28 November

I'm still processing images from the memorable morning at Welney Wildfowl and Wetland Trust at the end of November which started with Moonlight gracing the wetland in front of the main hide.   These are handheld photographs lasting over 3 seconds, taken on a Sony RX100!   It was magical (I think I might have used that word before in this series!) to start the visit in the dark and trace the activity of wildfowl through dawn to a glorious cold, wintery sunny morning.   And I was still home before Robin's carer had arrived!

Sunset at the Research Park

One of the delights of posting to a blog (which I'm using as a photographic record of a year), means I can indulge in lots of record shots which I don't expect I shall put to any other use.   Sunsets fall into this category and the colours this evening (before 16.00) speak for themselves.  

I went to the Research Park to see if I could see and photograph a Yellow-legged Gull and an Iceland Gull - neither on this occasion.

Coxes on The Cam

There was a different rowing event on The Cam on Friday morning which I chanced upon.   All The Bumps are rowed upstream with the mission to 'bump' the boat ahead before/without being 'bumped' from behind.   On Friday there was a timed event rowing downstream!   All the crews were 'eights' and at least one crew was from 'the other place' - Pembroke College, Oxford.

Here are photographs of some of the Coxes enthusiastically encouraging their crews to reach the finish line as quickly as possible.     Some of the rowing was ragged and splashy by this point!

By this time the crews had finished racing and were congregating 'alongside', down at Bait's Bite Lock.

Winter morning at the Lazy Otter

The morning light this morning was dramatic across the Fens (south of the Lazy Otter), and had a magical range of colours. 

This 'Westie' thoroughly enjoyed being a dog!
 

Male Hen Harrier

A couple of images of the Male Hen Harrier I enjoyed watching, albeit at a distance, on Wicken Fen the other day.

Hen Harrier and Carrion Crow

The performers in these images were a long way away, but need to be included in the blog because of their novelty value for being on Wicken Fen.   It could have been the same Carrion Crow, although unlikely, but this time a Crow was mobbing a female Hen Harrier - the first I had seen at Wicken Fen.   Shortly after this I saw a male Hen Harrier (future posting)!   All very exciting!   Once the female Hen Harrier dropped to the ground, in the bottom picture, the corvid left the scene.

Harrier and Corvid

A Marsh Harrier and Carrion Crow at Wicken Fen spent a long while appearing to be aggressive towards one another.   I didn't see them actually attack one another, just fly towards the other and swoop and turn with amazing agility.  

"Swans Awake" II

As dawn broke the significant change to the images was the background colour and whether the Swans were flying towards the sun or away from it.   This is a long posting as I can't not include the full range of background colours!

 .... and more

 .... and yet more