Harlequin Ladybird on the Breakfast Menu - Lackford Lakes

It was a windy day for macro shots and I had forgotten replacement batteries for the flash so difficult to get close-up shots. Here a couple of spiders wrapping their prey, Speckled Bush Crickets (very difficult to accommodate those antennae and two different wasp mimics from two very different families - first a Soldier Fly and, lastly, a Hoverfly.

Heron, Kingfisher and Friends at Lackford Lakes

The small birds were sheltering on a very blustery day at Lackford Lakes yesterday but made up for by being able to photograph Kingfisher among the summer flowers, grumpy Heron, Great Crested Grebe with fish, pursued by its young(look at its huge paddle yellow feet) and Cormorants who didn't keep to the odd number rule for good composition.

 

Lackford Lakes - Egrets, Kingfishers and More

There was plenty of activity at Lackford Lakes yesterday but most at a distance. The Egrets were the most confiding - good to see a pair with the male crest. The Great Crested Grebes, as always, decided to do their weed dance in the far distance and even the kingfishers (two different sites) didn't come very close along with the Snipe. The closest bird was the final Chiffchaff

Lackford Lakes 10 o'clock Kingfisher

A Kingfisher has arrived at around 10 o'clock each time with have been to Lackford recently and at 10.12am it was there on its perch waiting for a portrait. Tried to guess where it would enter the water but only got the reflection. Adult Great Crested Grebe busy catching fish and offering to its youngster.

Grey Heron at Lackford

A very obliging Heron in pristine plumage entertained us at Lackford on Saturday.

Egrets at Lackford

A party of four Egrets were busy hunting Dragonflies on the water's edge at Lackford Lakes on Saturday and were amazingly successful. The light was constantly changing from sun to quite heavy cloud - hence the different tint of the whites. Last image taken with the 2X converter on the 400 - only works when aperture shut down (f14). Rest 1.4X 

 

Kingfishers and Image Corruption

I borrowed Phil's 400 DO lens yesterday and ran it off my Canon 1D mark IV at Lackford Lakes. Generally pleased with results but, unfortunately a large number of files were corrupt giving very interesting artifacts but not helpful when the best in a sequence always seemed to be the ones not useable.
Here are some Kingfisher images - he (no red on mandible) caught 3 fish - one so small not really worth the effort and hovered a couple of times in front of some reeds.