A freezing cold end of January afternoon called for a walk around somewhere coastal & exposed. The place to do that nearby, was chosen to be Normandy Marsh, part of the Keyhaven – Lymington Nature Reserve, where it is really exposed. Armed with a folding seat and my 300mm lens and 1.4x converter, I set off on a hunt for some wading winter birds. As the tide was out, but incoming this meant some of the smaller birds were near the shore.
Handily, the part where most of the waders were, was on the slope out to the sea, which was out of the bitter wind. Sitting around, and not pointing the lens for a while, meant some of the birds got really close, allowing for some reasonable shots. The ISO having to be upped due to the overcast day, and the frantic movements of the birds.
This lone Sanderling, was however, not so sure about being close up to a lens, a beat a swift retreat.
Whilst sitting around, I noticed a Herring gull picking up snails, flying up and dropping them on the pebbles to snack on the smashings.
The dunlin after a short while got close up, allowing some shots of them feeding in the mud.
And the wind affects them too.
A lone Redshank was another close approaching bird.
Finally as the tide came it was time for the birds to find somewhere else to feed, and me to find somewhere warm up 🙂
About ChrisA
I have been taking photography seriously since 2004. I have a website dedicated to my favourite type of photography - macro @ www.macro-photo.co.uk I also enjoy taking landscape and wildlife shots, which I show on akeyphoto.co.uk I hope you enjoy both websites.
