Saturday, January 10, 2009

Beasts Of The Park.

As I mentioned in the previous post, I'd gone out yesterday for a few hours with my trusty camera and tripod and planned to roam the park taking photos of any critters I came across as I've never been very happy with the sharpness of previous photos.

I'm now thinking that I'm just expecting too much from my lenses and enlarging the photos so that an eyeball fills the laptop screen and expecting it to be pin sharp is......well just expecting too much.

As I'm not in a financial position to buy £10,000 lenses, I guess I'll have to make do until that lottery win comes along. Maybe buying a ticket would increase my odds of winning !

Anyway, as usual, give these photos a click to see them in more detail. 



I went along the edge of the lake and found this turtle sitting on the bank beside the cart path. He or she (I wasn't going to turn IT over to check) was happily sunbathing and every so often would slowly stick out a back leg and push itself a bit further along.

I did use the tripod but none of the shots came out any better than when I hand held the camera so like I said at the start, I think I've leave the tripod behind unless I need it for very specific photos.



I'd never seen a turtle head up close and looking at these photos, I'm not impressed. It's an ugly looking thing and I'm not surprised it spends its time inside a shell.

As I was now close to the wooden pier, I walked out along it as birds always like to perch there and look down into the waters below for a tasty morsel to swim by. Ok so this little fella wouldn't know what to do with a fish if he fell over a dead one but he was the only one worth taking a photo of yesterday.



Leaving the pier behind I went along the canal path and there are always birds there watching the fishermen and hoping to get some scraps. I've uploaded photos of this fella a few times but when the sun catches his white feathers, he's just so darn photogenic. He'll also pose rock steady for ages and so a tripod is never needed.



This next one is a close up of one of the ducks which arrived before Christmas and seem happy to be still here. I've never seen their type before in the park so I need help identifying the breed but again, looks wise, only it's mother could love it.



Finally, there are always opportunities to get photos of squirrels here. They'll come right up to you wanting to be fed and plenty of residents do feed them even though the park rules state that no animals should be fed.

This one just scampered up a tree, turned around and faced back down again before settling on this pose for a good few minutes. Again no tripod was needed.



By now it was almost time for sunset and that nicely brings me back to the previous post. If you haven't read it, do so now and then come back to this one and then go back to that one and........well what else do you have to do on a Saturday night ??!!!

5 comments:

  1. Your pictures are always nicely composed - just keep clickin' and we'll keep lookin'....

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  2. From your Critturs Correspondent - I think that black bird's another Boat-Tailed Grackle and hope so as it's the best bird name I've ever heard. Then there's a white heron - beautiful. Don't know what kind the turtle is but he looks as though he's been around the block a few times. Then there's a Muscovy Duck. I bet he's thinking "I wish I looked like that heron, it's not FAIR." Lovely photos!

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  3. Yep, a Muscovy duck - I knew that! In fact I have a photo of one somewhere on my blog, taken down at the lake in the valley here. They get around, don't they! ;)

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  4. The turtle is a Florida Cooter (funny name for a great reptile!). They're mostly what you'll see basking in BB. This one is probably a male (long nails to hold on to his girlie) and I agree with Daphne - he's been around the pond a while. Regarding the squirrel, (and considering your qwirky sense of humor), I thought you might find this article from the NY Times interesting. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/07/dining/07squirrel.html?scp=1&sq=squirrels&st=cse

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  5. Fab photos, as usual... Thanks SB!

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