Lesvos, Greece ~ 27th Apr - 4th May - 2013

Me & Richard booked flights and hotel with Travel Republic and flew out of Gatwick on the 27th Apr, mid afternoon we collected our prearranged car from Tsalis, mention Lesvos Birding and you get 15% off .. nice .. Our car was a Hyundai Colt and once out of the airport headed straight for the saltpans ...

Once at the Kalloni Saltpans we abandoned the car and went off on foot... Now it seems this is not the norm as most if not all especially photographers just drive about with there Lenses out the window pointing downwards at the birds, each to there own !! .. I bet you have some nice angled POV images ..

Birds of note .. Little Bittern, Squacco Heron, Greater Flamingo, Glossy Ibis & Red-throated Pipit.

Wood Sandpiper

Black Stork

Little Tern

Temminck's Stint

After sunset and a few wrong turns we found our hotel 

Pela Hotel

A great hotel, lovely food and friendly family run place highly recommended !!

Day 2

05:30 and off for our first target near Petra at Kavaki, Ruppell's Warbler which was so showy but only on a wire and I flatly refuse to photograph on wire !!
Crag Martin, Alpine Swift, Red-rumped Swallow & Raven here ..

Checked a few other sites as per Dudley Guide and then headed for Napi Valley via Kapi and Mantamados.

C.1.5km before Napi we found a confiding wheatear at the roadside ..

Black-eared Wheatear

We did a recce at the Kruper's site .. Finishing off back at the saltpans and trying our luck with some of the tracks and ending up at the River Ford.
Male Little Crake here which I tried for a few evenings but no images gained ..

Black headed Wagtail

Day 3

05:30 and were heading for our next main target Kruper's Nuthatch, a really nice peaceful morning, heard Cuckoo & Golden Oriole, Short-toed Eagle over and Middle Spotted Woodpecker here ..

Kruper's Nuthatch

From here to Polichnitos Saltpans and our sites as per the guide ...

Curlew Sandpiper

Black-winged Stilt

Little Ringed Plover

We had Marsh Sandpiper & Stone Curlew here before heading back to Kalloni saltpans till dusk at the Ford ..

Yellow Wagtail ~ (dombrowskii)

Black headed Bunting

Day 4

05:30 and were heading west first stop Ipsilou Monastery and Cinereous and Cretzschmar's without to much trouble gaining images of was more difficult ..

Cretzschmar's Bunting

Next was the Petrified Forest, we must of spent all of 5 minutes looking for the robin and moved on ... Lesser Kestrel and Female Montagu's here ..

Crested Lark

Little Owl

Lesser Grey Shrike

On to Sigri, really didn't give it enough time here and after an hour of trying headed back to Kalloni !!!!!!!!!!!
Although there were plenty of Flycatcher's here just not close enough ....

A quick stop at the secret owl site, hush-hush-wink-wink

Long-eared Owl

And in the next tree ...

Scop's Owl

If only that branch wasn't there !!!!

And finished off till dusk back at the saltpans ...

Kentish Plover

Day 5

06:00 start today and armed with more info we headed again for Kavaki, this time to the first lay-by ...

There were already two cars waiting one on wheatear, the other on the warbler...

We were patient and waited our turn, once the bloke in front had 3 good go's at the warbler from his car, it was our turn so we got out the car and set-up, he drove off ...

Ruppell's Warbler

Eastern Orphean Warbler

Black capped Jay

All on the same bush along with Subalpine Warbler and out of the car !!

We did the same route towards Napi Valley adding some off roading up to the two radio masts..

And looking for suitable Rock Nuthatch sites on down towards Napi ..
Seven Bee-eaters and a few Shrikes ..

Sombre Tit

Back to Kalloni saltpans and out to the beach Tamirisk for the robin which turned into two birds and were on the move and difficult to approach ..

But looked nice against the sunset .

Rufous Bush Robin

Day 6

A first light try for the Robin, which constantly sang from Tamirisk ..

But we had a bonus warbler ...

Eastern Olivaceous Warbler

Off next for our Nuthatch site,

a few images from distance then a slow move in every time the bird flew off I moved in, took about 30/40 minutes until I was in position ....

Great .. errr No, the birds behaviour had changed, now coming in as if its body was stuck to the rock !!

Once it had entered and gone off I retreated and left them ... Scrim net next time !!!

Rock Nuthatch

Now the plan was to go to Ag. Fokas from Napi about 1hr 40 drive in 31 degrees but here's a tip ..

Don't have the car heater on max it makes you really sleepy !!

An hour in and was struggling to stay awake not realising I still had the heater on from first thing this morning..

So stopped off at Polichnitos Saltpans to rest but 34 Little Stints soon livened me up ...

Once I knew where they liked to feed, just had to wait, wasn't long and they were flushed by a Stilt so in I went ...

Laying on top of the heather to keep me out the mud, should of been lower as this made the lens about 12" above water level and then they flew back in !!!
We should of been here much later in the softer light ..

Shooting at midday was hard trying to get catchlight in the eyes and just when they were stupidly close my battery died ... a short wait for them to be flushed by the Stilt again and i moved back to the car !!

Little Stint

Moving on to Ag. Fokas we had both Yelkouan c.700+ & Scopoli's c.1 yep only one but thats enough ...

Red-backed Shrike

And back for another go at the Rufous Robin near Kalloni saltpans ...

White-winged Black Tern

Rufous Bush Robin

Day 7

05:30 and out west way past Parakila for Makara .. hoping for another chance with Cinereous but no ...
Long-legged Buzzard over 

And we stalked a Chukar out near Makara ...

Chukar

Out on the beach the Dudley guide had sites for pools and we found Alpine Swifts coming to drink on the wing great to watch ...

Alpine Swift

Now back to Efthalou 

Middle Spotted Woodpecker

And then to the Thrush site which is better in the afternoon light ...

Blue Rock Thrush

And back at the Kalloni saltpans till dusk ...

Whiskered Tern

and our last sunset

Day 8

We tried Metochi Lake first thing, Heron's & Bittern's and loads of people so on to the saltpans ..

Common Tern

Whiskered Tern

Little Tern

And then off to the Airport ...

Seen but failed to get images of ..

Red-Throated Pipit

Little Crake

Spur-winged Plover

Subalpine Warbler

Thanks to

Pela & Thekla at Pela Hotel

Alan & Bob

and 

" The Image Collector "

Some of these species will be covered with more images in seperate blog posts 

Lesvos nearly Done !!  

Peregrine Falcon ~ Undisclosed site - 07.04.13

 The only thing so far to get the blood pumping was running after a fox that some how was dragging a fence post along !!!

Full Fox story is at the end           

 Enthusiasm levels were needing a boost with little in the way of action so far this weekend, it seemed a good plan to try out the Falcon's again ..

Peregrines are Schedule 1 species covered by The Wildlife & Countryside Act 1981
** see note below **

We watched them always at distance, way out of camera range even super crops wouldn't of worked !!
After over 2hrs with only fly-by's, it was going to be a failed outing for images.
Whilst waiting I was joined by Anna from Kansas and chatting asked what I was photographing, as if by magic the male flew closer in !!
She carried on her walk, and then I had some sort of Telepathic connection with Jono, changing camera settings.
** More about this below **

Another hour gone, and we hadn't moved from the same spot, still only distant views with prey mainly Starlings, flown in, not caught in view of us now there's an image !!
Then the female started calling she had come in un-noticed about 100m's away and was quickly joined by the male we were watching.
They then Mated and pleased with himself put on a celebratory display, at times to close to fit in the frame !!
This lasted or seemed to last for ages and as the male had only Me & Richard, to show off to, it did just that.
Gaining height then diving, twisting and a couple of stoops it was fantastic.
It perched up a few times in between this crazy display that seemed just for us.

"Unbelievable" as Hans says !!

So here we go ... eye contact

Peregrine Falcon

The only Female image 

Male with Common Snipe ?


~~~~~~~~~~~~~


** Wildlife & Countryside Act 1981 **
Schedule 1 Birds & the Law

To make sure we were covered for Photography of Peregrine Falcon at this un-disclosed site, during the breeding season.

Contacted Natural England to make sure were covered !!

And we are ..
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~

" The Fox & Fence Post "


Yesterday, Saturday morning we tried Shellness for more Wader images on the early High Tide we failed as the light was all wrong. Walking back to the car along the beach I could see a fox in the distance with some strange behaviour !!
It kept running a short distance & stopping turning round, repeatedly ... Huh !! it was dragging a lump of wood along the beach and not a small bit, it was 6' foot long !!
Firstly I thought that it was playing with it, maybe some fox type workout to impress the lady foxes but decided that surely it must have somehow got rope tangled round its leg !!
Not prepared to leave it, I waited for Richard, we put the camera's away and set off after the fox. There's a saying " You can't out wit a Fox " cleverly we thought we'd cut it off by going across the Nudist beach, depending on which way you look at it luckily there was no-one. Thinking we'd come out roughly where the fox was, but by now it was another 100m's down the beach and still going knowing we were near it ...
I'm now running after it, forcing it nearer to the sea and with a high beach retaining defence approaching was about to corner it ... The fox jumped it easily but the post snagged and now close grabbed for the post. 
What was joining the fox to the post was cable, it went under, in-between its back legs and seemed to vanish, so holding the cable pulling the fox closer which is now snarling and going for me, letting go again it looped around the groyne trying to go back off down the beach only snagging even further.
So off came the coat and I made a grab for the fox, once the fox was restrained and in the darkness of the coat it carmed down.
Richard moved in to untangle it, " It's a Snare "
We swapped holds and set about the snare which was tight around the fox's waist, it hadn't done to much damage, a bit of blood but not broken the skin.
Once free of the snare and let loose it was off down the beach like a rocket !!

A Snare is a crude way of trapping and killing, unfortunately in a slow and painful way .. A loop like lasso of cable is used, the more the animal pulls the tighter the loop gets, So round the neck the animal strangles itself  but anywhere else and its even a slower death..

Fox's, Rabbit etc have regular paths which they take the snare is staked out across the path.

So one very lucky fox !!


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


** Camera Settings **

Those who have to listen to my continual moaning about sharpness, over-cropping and image stabilisation know how I just keep going on about In-Flight image keeper rate, sharpness etc ...
So with all others settings tried and tested I looked in to ...

AI SERVO - Tracking Sensitivity 

You can set this from 'standard' to 'fast' and a few intermediate ones between.
0 ~ Standard
1 ~ Slow
2 ~ Moderately slow
3 ~ Moderately fast
4 ~ Fast

This doesn't directly effect sharpness etc

I've had it on 'Standard' continually.

Most or nearly all suggest setting this to 'Standard' or 'Slow' reason being that when tracking a bird in-flight and it fly's behind a telegraph pole or tree the tracking doesn't lose focus, it holds focus so you can keep tracking through !!

But ... what if your tracking a bird and when you first  press to focus you are on the tail, you keep tracking not loosing focus because the camera is set it doesn't adjust.
Once you have focus, slow to lose it and slow to regain it also .. slow to adjust !!

So it was set to ... Fast

But ... what if your tracking a bird and when you first press to focus you are on the tail, you keep tracking not loosing focus but because its now on 'Fast' the camera is re-adjusting to refocus ..
Once you have focus, fast to lose it and fast to 
regain it also .. fast to adjust !!

Makes sense to me !!

This doesn't directly effect sharpness etc as I've said but in a way it adjusts quicker so when you do press the shutter your focused where you expect it to be ..

So more accurately focus images, means sharper and better keeper rate.


Now that's a mega blog !!