This bull likes to eat grass silage as supplementary feed. By the way, so does the rest of the family. Many bird sounds can be heard in the background. The most recognizable is that of geese, those who know about it will undoubtedly hear a dozen other bird species and those who listen carefully will hear the unmissable unique sound of Cranes at about the middle of the video.
A nice surprise!
We are back for a week at our home address in Alphen aan den Rijn.
Today my first morning walk with the leashed dogs around the Zaans Rietveld nature reserve.
Quite a few birds to see, especially flying ones, such as oystercatchers, ducks, jackdaws, geese and starlings with their beaks full of food for the youngsters on the nest.
Fairly close also a praying Kestrel that clearly had prey in mind.
Suddenly he dropped down lightning fast and arrived on the ground I saw him fluttering and running after a prey.
Unfortunately, the speed of the crash to the ground was so high that I couldn’t follow it with my telephoto lens, but all the better after that.
When he or she flew up again, the bird had prey in its beak and it is clearly visible that it is a Cricket Cricket.
With a good number of successful pictures I go home very satisfied.
Back home I edited the pictures with Adobe Lightroom Classic and Photoshop to reduce any noise, optimize sharpness and adjust the file format for web publishing.
The pictures were taken with the Canon EOS R7 and the Canon RF 100-500MM F/4.5-7.1 L IS USM lens
My Reflection Pool
In the area of our permanent summer base at Camping Landgoed Tolhek in Anderen, Drenthe, many bird species can be seen and photographed. It is only a pity that the background consists of spruce trees, which means that there are large differences between light and shadows in the background.
Watched many examples on Youtube for inspiration. That’s where the publications fell Jan Wegener en Duade Patron straight up. Not only the techniques for photographing birds, but also the correct camera settings and making setups.
The solution was to create an artificially blurred neutral background by dyeing a bedsheet with various natural colors in an overlapping pattern of spots.
To make it even more exciting to take pictures, it seemed nice to make a small reflection pool in the foreground at eye level while sitting in front of the caravan.
No sooner said than done, I thought. But to really dress it up with scenery and make it attractive so that birds would also use it was a bit more difficult.
The construction is now complete, the water basin is filled and part is decorated with bolmos and wood covered with moss. A problem with this is that when the bolmoss touches the water surface it immediately starts acting as a capillary vessel and sucks the water out of the water tank and it does not flow back into the tank but next to it and runs away.
Consequence….. adjust the construction so that the water runs back into the water tank.
I now know that real bolmos was not a good choice because birds looking for food really demolish everything. Next year I will replace the ball moss with coastal moss that cannot be distinguished from real moss in the picture.
Incidentally, at the time of writing this, the entire scenery has been replaced by feed silos with upright branches where the birds wait their turn until they can reach the feed silo.
Setting up a different scenery every now and then ensures that there are more composition options.
Magpie (Pica pica)
Today I attempted to take a pre-shot in RAW burst mode with the Canon EOS R7 and Canon RF 100-500mm F/4.5-7.1 L IS USM lens.
A pre-recording is done as follows: keep the shutter button, focus on the subject, pressed halfway and shoot at the moment the bird of e.g. a pole flies.
While the shutter button is pressed halfway, the camera shoots 15 images continuously, and after you press the shutter button all the way down, a series of photos are taken including the 15 images prior to the moment you press the shutter button all the way down.
And yes, it worked! With 30 images per second, you won’t miss a thing!
A Magpie flying up from a pole. Usually they are very nervous and skittish when you point a lens at them, but this one stayed there endlessly.
Luckily a couple of walkers walked up and “it” (to be neutral) thankfully flew away just before I had to give up as my arms and fingers cramped from aiming, holding Back focus and half holding of the shutter button.
Geplaatst in Fotografie, Natuur
Getagged a post, against a soft, background, bird, black, blurry, Canon EOS R7, CANON RF 100-500MM F/4.5-7.1 L IS USM, Cheeky, Close up, common magpie, corvids, ekster, Eurasian magpie, feathers, flying up, from, green, legs, Magpie, nature, noisy, omnivore, Pica pica, pole, pre-recording, raw burst, robber, robbers, sharp beak, smart, spread, stretched, tree pole, white, wildlife, wings
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Lusthof De Haeck
Today to Lusthof De Haeck on the edge of the Nieuwkoopse Plassen. Not a bird to be seen except geese until suddenly a cloud of flying birds was seen in the distance with a huge bird in between. Yes, a white-tailed eagle (Haliaeetus albicilla).
Didn’t even know they used to live here. A pleasant surprise and a photo! Not the best because the tree in which he / she was later on the lookout was more than 1300 meters away.
Wren (Troglodytes troglodytes)
The Wren, a small, very fast and inconspicuous bird, but sings like a nightingale and is the ultimate challenge for every photographer to photograph the bird.
Today I succeeded, although I had to remove the necessary disturbing twigs with the help of Photoshop. That in itself is a challenge!
Geplaatst in Fotografie
Getagged bird, nature, shouting, singing, Troglodytes troglodytes, wildlife, Winterkoning, wren
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Kestrel (Falco tinnunculus)
Today I went out with my dogs Kira and Rox to the Reeuwijkse Hout near the Reeuwijkse Plassen. Nice and muddy on the grass paths so those two could have fun. Romp and sniff.
There were not many birds with the exception of a Kestrel that stayed very close to me so that I could photograph it nicely. There appeared to be an already dead prey in his field of vision.
Geplaatst in Fotografie
Getagged bird of prey, blue sky, Falco tinnunculus, hovering, hunting, kestrel, praying, predator, Reeuwijkse Hout, Reeuwijkse plassen
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