Slimbridge & Shropshire

 Last week were headed south to spend a couple nights in the campervan in Somerset. On the way back up we stopped in Gloucestershire at a campsite near WWT Slimbridge. Slimbridge is brilliant for bird watching and that was instantly clear as in the first hide we went to there were views of one of the UK's best birds - the avocet. I've seen avocets before at RSPB Burton Mere but it was great to see them again. Avocets are one of britians most interesting looking birds (their upturned beak helping with feeding) and they are the bird on the RSPB's official logo. They're probably my favourite wader.

Here is a nice one of an oystercatcher:

While at Slimbridge there was one bird I was desperate to see in particular - the UK's tallest bird: the common crane. We did see two of them from the next hide but they were super far away (probably just under a mile away). The camera does have a brillaint lens but the photos still weren't great:

We stopped for lunch and then walked around to the other side of the reserve towards a tower hide that overlooks the estuary. On the way, we stopped at a hide looking onto a reed bed where several reed warblers kept giving us fleeting glimpses. I've never phtographed one before, so we waited a couple of minutes until I got lucky and managed to get a couple of brilliant photos. 

From the tower hide we saw barnacale geese, greylag geese and even more cranes. They were still a really long way away though:

We could spot two more cranes much closer to another hide though, so I decided to walk round there. On the way there I saw these avocet chicks which are super cool:

I got to the other hide and I was right - the cranes were much closer and I finally got the photos I was after. Here are my best shots of the UK's tallest bird:

Here's a photo of a reed warbler I took while in the same hide:

That was everything we saw at Slimbridge, but here are some more photos from a river near the campsite. They include mandarin ducklings, a damslefly and a cignet. 

 The next stop on the way home was Shropshire. Here are some photos I took while out on a walk.

One of the best parts of my walk was how quiet it was - I didn't see another person the whole time. I found a spot with a brillaint view but also noticed a bird I hadn't seen in a good while - the linnet. Not just one either, there were several hopping about the bushes in front of me. This allowed me to take some brillaint pictures, probably some of the best I have taken of a passerine before. Here are some ones of a female linnet:

And here are some brilliant shots of a male linnet:

The next day we stopped off at the national trust site carding mill valley. I was hoping to spot a ring ouzel, which I did get a glimpse of, but didn't manage to get a photo. I also heard quite a few whinchats but didn't get a picture. My best picture I took there was probably this one of a wild pony with the shropshire hill in the background. 

Here are a couple photos of a wren and a chaffinch.

That's all for today's post. Some more great photos and sightings to add to the year. Remember to leave a comment and thanks for reading.

Chinese Deer In Staffordshire

Today's post is a camera trap one, but not one from the fox denn like I had said. There will be a post on that out soon, but first we will have a look a some footage from a different location. If you remember last year, I set up the camera trap in the Churnet valley to try and get some footage of the UK's smallest deer species - the muntjac. I didn't get any muntjacs on the camera trap, but I did get a sparrowhawk and a bat. I also set it up in a different place in the valley for a few weeks, but didn't get a thing. There have been quite a few sightings of muntjac in the churnet valley but as far as I am aware there is no public footage of any (I believe Staffordshire wildlife trust have had footage of them on camera traps they set up to observe wether or not there might be a very small pine marten population in the valley). The only other place in Staffordshire that I am aware of a muntjac population is Cannock Chase which is quite a bit further away to me than the Churnet valley (there likely will be other populations elsewere in the county).  

Anyway, a few weeks ago I set up the camera trap in a new spot at the top of the valley in an area of woodland where the trees are very sparse, and the ground is covered in bracken which is perfect muntjac habitat. I had found an obvious trail and strapped the camera up to a tree to see what it would pick up. 

Historically, muntjac are a recent addition to Britian's fauna. Like with most british deer, they escaped from wealthy estates in the 20th century after being brought over from China. The owners of estates liked excotic deer and it is the same story for fallow deer, sika deer and the very rare chinese water deer. The main source of the UK 's (most notably England's) muntjacs was an escape from Woburn park in the early 20th century, where they have spread across the country up to the west midlands and have become very common in the home counties. They have spread pretty much everywhere now from the midlands and south, with one population being in the Forest of Dean where I had a few dodgy photos of them on the camera trap in 2020 while searching for wild boar.  There are a few small pockets of them in Wales and no established population in Scotland despite the odd one being reported. Northern English counties are a bit a of a grey area. They wouldn't have all come from Woburn, with a few other escapes and releases likely. However they got there, there is an established population in the Churnet valley in Staffordshire. They're the animals I wanted to get footage of. 

Flash forward a couple of weeeks and you get to today. I went to get my camera trap and upon arrival learned that the memory card had got full after 3 days, which is a bit annoying as I likely missed out on some footage between then and now. The odd thing was that as I flicked through the photos and videos, nothing appeared to be there - it seemed to all just be leaves or something blowing in the wind that for some reason set the camera off constantly which is something I will have to fix. I was beginning to lose hope and started to wonder wether all the footage was like this when a finally had something. A squirrel. However, the next few files seemed to have something a little bit bigger. In the early morning hours, two muntjac appeared out of the bracken and onto the trail I had found:

My knowledge on muntjacs isn't great, but as far as I'm aware I didn't all the deer where female as none had antlers although I could be wrong. The next night was also succesful. First was this great video of a  badger (only my second badger clip of the year but it is a really good video):

Then two more muntjac appeared. One of them is a bit smaller than the other but I can't tell wether it is particularly young or not. It is possibily though as they give birth at any time of year and it would show that it is a healthy breeding population.

Muntjac are super quick, as this clip in the morning shows:

I believe we got fooatge of about 3, and it is the best footage that we got of them:

Unfotunatlley, that was all we got before the memory card ran out of space. I'll have to put it out there again soon. It's another one to tick off after three attempts at recording them, and another one that I've ticked off in this brilliant spring for the blog. Anyway, that's all for todays post. Remember to leave a comment and thanks for reading!

Watching Fox Cubs

A few days ago, I found a burrow that I thought was a badger one so I set up one of my camera traps. As it turned out, it wasn't a badger sett but actually a fox denn. Some of the footgae from the camera trap we have had already is amazing, with videos of the fox cubs (I believe there is about 5) fighting over food and exploring the area. There will be a few posts from that camera trap out soon, but tonight I walked down to see if I could see the cubs for myself. 

Once I got to the denn, I set up and tried to get comfy in a bush a few metres away from the earth. After about two hours, I had my first glimpse of one poke its head out. Even though I knew that the foxes were there, it was still had a sense of something unexpected about it. A few minutes later and more of them appeared. I think they could sense that I was there as they weren't leaving the burrow as bravely as they had been on the camera trap, but there were still a few chances for some brilliant shots. Unfortunatley, the camera was struggling to focus because of the low light so most of the photos werent that good. However, if you keep trying you will eventually get something out of am encounter like this. This was one of the only in focus photos, but the two hour wait in a cold bush was worth it for this phtoto alone. It's my favourite photo I've ever taken of a fox, even better than the one last year. The shot doesnt just have one fox though; it has two:

I can't really put into words how pleased I am with this picture, another one to add to the amazing collection this year. This Spring has been the best few months I think I've ever had wildlife watching and we still have a month left. The shore lark, osprey, red squirrels, roe deer, barnacle geese, wheatear and now this photo of these two fox cubs, all in two months. Stay tuned for more posts on the fox denn, as the camera trap already has and will hopefully continue to capture some more brilliant footage.

Scotland - Day 3

 The final day in Scotland had a few nice suprises. We drove to Caerlaverock castle and once we finsihed looking around we walked to the coastal anture reserve. I was expecting much but once we got to a hide I used my thermal imaging camera to spot some roe deer about a kilometere away. It was a good job I had a long lens on the camera. It was so far away that the land you can see behind it is actaully Cumbria:

There wsn't just a doe, there was also a buck lying down in the grass:

After we spotted a huge flock of barnacle geese we walked around to see if we could get a closer look. The geese were super far away, maybe even a mile:

 

Luckily I did manage to get a good photo when some flew over much closer:

Barancle geese are pretty rare, I've only ever seen one before at Sandbach Flashes.

The geese weren't the only bird I saw though as I saw a red kite, kestrel and even a few wheatear. I'd never seen a wheatear before and when one landed on a fence post I managed to get an few pictures:

That's all for today's post, and that's everything fromm the Scotland trip. It was one of the best weeks of my life for wildlife watching and I can't wait to hopefully go back to Scotland in the future and see what else I can find. Remember to leave a comment and thanks for reading!