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PeterHG's Big Year-4th time


PeterHG

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Thanks, @Dave Williams, @Kitsafari an @Zim Girl

Time to deal with some duck back home....

 

273. Gadwall. Arkemheen. March 2019. One of the more common ducks in the area. Numbers have increased over the last 30 years or so and, though never in great concentrations, you cannot really miss them in the local wetlands. Not the most striking duck, but the male has beautiful brown wing patches.

female:

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male:

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274. Tufted Duck. Arkemheen, March. Even more common than the previous one.

 

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275. Common Starling. Arkemheen, Febr. Still in winter plumage here.

 

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276. Tawny Owl. Amersfoort, March. In our local park, this owl could be seen for a few weeks high up in the same tree. A heavy crop, due to the distance. Not in my garden, I'm afraid, but close enough....;)

 

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Dave Williams

That camera/lens  combination is very, very impressive when in the right hands. 

 

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Peter Connan

I agree!

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Thanks, @Dave Williams and @Peter Connan! I must say I am quite happy with the new combo and it has given me good results both in Costa Rica and the Netherlands. It is also a matter of not looking back and trying not to replicate exactly how I worked with the Canon. I haven't really mastered the menu system yet, but I trust that, despite my age, I will someday ;)

 

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277. Eurasian Jay. Amersfoort, March. Used to be a forest-dwelling bird, but like the Magpie it has become more adapted to urban life. It is still quite shy, however, much more so than the Magpie.

 

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278. Wood Pigeon. Arkemheen, March. By fare the commonest of the 'wild' pigeons.

 

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279. Blue Tit. Amersfoort, March. We only have a small garden and do not get exciting visitors like some BY members, but the Blu Tit is a regular guest at the feeders.

 

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280. Eurasian Nuthatch. Amersfoort, April. Quite a common bird in the local park, where, especially in spring, you can often hear its characteristic call. Spring, of course, also brings other duties.....

 

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Edited by PeterHG
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281. Glossy Ibis, Bunschoten, April. A friend of mine texted me and asked what the unusual-looking bird was that he encountered on his bicycle ride in the polders.  He included a short iPhone video. I asked him where he was and told him to stay put. I grabbed my bike and half an hour later I sat beside him, watching this quite rare visitor form the south. As it turned out the sighting had been mentioned on the internet, but, my head still being in Costa Rica, I hadn't looked.

 

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282. Western Jackdaw. Amersfoort, April. So common that you really need a BY thread to remind you to take a picture of one.

 

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283. Blackcap. Amersfoort, April. Almost a nemesis bird for me as far as photos are concerned. When in the local park I can hear their song regularly, but most of the time they stay hidden. This rather distant shot was all I could come up with this spring. 

 

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284. Garganey. Arkemheen, April. Not very common around here, so I'm always delighted to see one.

 

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That Bluethroat and your BIFs are stunning. A level of photography to really aspire to! 

Edited by lmSA84
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Thanks for the kind words, @lmSA84!

 

And then the swallows were back. The nice thing about taking a trip to the southern hemisphere in February is that spring will arrive soon after you return. Time to test the Olympus combo with swallows...;)

 

285. Barn Swallow. Arkemheen, April.

 

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286. Sand Martin. Arkemheen, April. Declining in numbers mainly for the lack of adequate nesting sites.

 

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287. House Martin. Arkemheen, April.

 

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Waiting for the moment a perched bird flies off and capturing that very moment is quite a challenge and mostly results in shots of empty branches. The Olympus has, what they call, a Pro capture mode. This basically means that when you point your camera (preferably with lens:) towards a bird and half press the shutter, the camera continuously takes pictures and dynamically stores the last 35 in its internal memory. The moment the bird actually flies off you fully press the shutter and you do get your empty branches but also, hopefully, the ones just before the take-off that were stored. It does not work every time and the bird should fly off in a direction parallel to the perch, but it's nice to try. Here I did so, not with branches, but a little mud pool where the Martins and Swallows were gathering nesting material.

 

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Edited by PeterHG
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The new gear turned your BY into a BIF year! Excellent photos, Peter.

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pedro maia

Just like my swallows pictures :lol:!

 

Stunning shots Peter.

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Sorry for so many likes Peter, and for the erratic way I have gone through your posts. I don't usually have a lot of time to go back through all the posts I miss when I am away but every time I jumped to another page I just had to look at the one before. 

So many stunning birds and such lovely photographs. I particularly like the fact that we don't get to see them here very often, certainly not as often as we get the African species posted. It is a shame, because other parts of the World have so much to offer.

 

While your Costa Rica shots were glorious, you have done pretty well closer to home too. Some great images from NL.

 

Very happy that your new camera gear is working well for you. I'd love to ditch some weight (and not just on the camera gear :() but I have not yet found a lighter option I like as much as my current gear. I tried the new Nikon mirrorless cameras but they were just too small in my hands - I like chunky cameras - and I know they are way way better than they sued to be but I still don't like EVF. 

 

For a while I was very tempted by the Fujifilm XT cameras, but I just have too much invested in Nikon. 

 

 

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Thanks @xelas, @pedro maia and @Soukous.

 

and I know they are way way better than they used to be but I still don't like EVF. 

I absolutely see your point there, Martin. They are indeed a lot better than the first generations, but there can still be a lag in waking up (albeit very short) and they do take some getting used to. Of course as far as exposure compensation and choice of aperture are concerned a live view of what the effects will be can be quite helpful, so there is an up-side, too. 

And yes, Costa Rica (and of course many countries in the South Americas) have a lot to offer as also the excellent collection in last year's BY by @xelasand @michael-ibk have shown. I'm glad you enjoyed them.

 

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Peter Connan

That's an amazing feature! But honestly, I am not sure you need it...

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very much enjoying the fantastic additions. 

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