Gwent birding (1 Viewer)

[Darryl]

Umm,... the important bit is that relating to 'near' (which was omitted from Jos' post), if my post simply repeats your sentiments, then you agree that a passerine is as often as not 'near' its nest during the breeding season and, therefore, in order to photograph a Schedule 1 passerine during the breeding season it would be at least prudent to get a licence.

Personally, I have only held 'scientific' Schedule 1 licences, for surveys and ringing (Woodlark, Cetti's and Darties being the recent ones).

Darryl

 

[GaryH]

Umm....just to cover my back, I also have a Schedule 1 licence for Little Ringed Plover, which is in my portfolio!

Gary

 

[oldgiteggy]

8 redpoll, 4 bullfinch, 5 siskin, 6 chaffinch, jackdaw, 6 goldfinch, greenfinch, dunnock great tit, blue tit, coal tit and wood pigeon at the feeders, this morning, all at the same time.

The tawny owls here are always out well before dark at the moment. We have had a male fly over us at roof height, 3 nights on the trot, at 8.30pm

 

[luke]

If anyones interested, Symonds Yat Rock was particularly good today with the peregrines now sitting on eggs and a further two intruding birds appeared throughout the morning. Plenty of action all day long! Also a Gos about in the morning and loads of buzzard, marsh tit about the car park and plenty of Goosander on the river a pair of Mandarins.

 

[oldgiteggy]

Tawny owls again - 3 males and 1 female. Sounds like the successful male was making a strange coooooing noise. Never heard that before.

 

[The Valley Walker]

Saw my 1st swallow over the weekend....flew right over the garden - it was so low it was nearly a garden tick! That apart spent a few enjoyable hours up in Gigrin with Mike & loads of the BF members including our old pal Ken. Same old same old in the garden so I won't list em as you are probably bored lifeless with them now.
Long they may continue though!!

 

[Jos Stratford]

Umm,... the important bit is that relating to 'near' (which was omitted from Jos' post), if my post simply repeats your sentiments, then you agree that a passerine is as often as not 'near' its nest during the breeding season and, therefore, in order to photograph a Schedule 1 passerine during the breeding season it would be at least prudent to get a licence.

Personally, I have only held 'scientific' Schedule 1 licences, for surveys and ringing (Woodlark, Cetti's and Darties being the recent ones).

Apologies for leaving out 'near', but unless you define 'near', it is a worthless statement when we are not talking about the immediate nest environment. Also, I wonder about the wording of the licence to photograph - I am surprised it is 'to disturb for purposes of photography'. Surely the onus should be on not on disturbing, rather than giving permission to disturb. Oh well.

Incidently, ringing schedule one birds, regardless of whether you have the necessary licence or not, is a whole lot more disruptive than a photographing, for example, a passing Woodlark, which may well not be nesting anywhere near.

 

[The Valley Walker]

Last two nights walking the dog I have heard a chiff chaff...tonight it was whilst walking around the Cardi, last night it was walking up the back lane - just wondering could I entice the little bugger into my garden - any thoughts?

Siskin n Redpolls are still about infact tonight a siskin was sat on the feeder way past 7 oclock, late bird or what!

 

[luke]

No chance of getting the chiff in the garden unless it decides to come and sing from a tree in the garden?

 

[mike from ebbw]

Garnlydan res

Popped up the res for an hour this morning with the Dog.
Plenty about including pairs of Skylark,Mipit,Wheatear,Stonechat,Reed Bunting,loads of Gulls (mixed) and oddly a pair of Cormorant that have been present for a few days now.There was also a single Swallow and the most confiding male Wheatear I have come across yet.It was raining but he was begging to have his photo taken so risked the camera getting wet.

 

[luke]

Had a really hard day at work, had to watch an Osprey flying up the river Wye and watched a peregrine catch and wrestle a Jackdaw. Oh... and to make the day even worse i had to watch 3 Goshawk displaying abover us. i cant wait to change my job!

 

[mike from ebbw]

Had a really hard day at work, had to watch an Osprey flying up the river Wye and watched a peregrine catch and wrestle a Jackdaw. Oh... and to make the day even worse i had to watch 3 Goshawk displaying abover us. i cant wait to change my job!

Sounds bloody awful mate LOL!

 

[luke]

i just noticed that i've invented a new word. In my last post i said 'Goshawk displaying abover us'. Abover means that the birds were above us then went over aswell. Who do i need to contact to get that put into the Oxford Dictionary??

Oh, and thanks for the simpathy mike!

 

[luke]

Had a quick look at the Bryn on the way home this evening, nothing out of the ordinary. plenty of Hirundines present, probably over 120 a third of which were house martins. Also a Green Sandpiper provided the only wader interest though there was a Little Egret wading in the oxbow. Only other migrant was a single White Wagtail.

At symonds yat this morning we had a fly over tree pipit.

 

[mike from ebbw]

Got my first Lesser Whitethroat yesterday evening in a tree outside the old British Steel General Offices,Ebbw Vale.
They dont like coming out in the open do they!

 

[luke]

Went to newport wetlands with Bill today with Bearded tit and Grasshopper Warbler in mind. We managed to hear a few Groppers but didn't see one, the beardies were much more obliging but refused to pose for a picture! This was the best i got, dont know about bill?

Anyway the Highlights were at least 6 Bearded Tit, 2 Grasshopper Warbler, 4 Lesser Whitethroat and 2 Little Ringed Plover showing well on the visitor centre 'scrape'. Also about were 9 Common Whitethroat, 25 Cetti's Warbler, plenty of Chiffchaff, Segdge and reed Warbler, 7 Willow Warbler, 3 Cuckoo, 13 Reed Bunting, and the Marsh harrier.

i just started trying to use Adobe CS3 and finding all a bit confusing so these are the only pics i attempted to do so far!

 

[luke]

Obviously i've over sharpened these, i'll try again soon!

 

[WHIMBREL]

Obviously i've over sharpened these, i'll try again soon!

Excellent images for two absolutely real tough species to photograph Luke, once you have got to grips with Adobe Photoshop CS3 your images will be crackers! Perhaps Mike, Gary or Al could help with a few tips as I'm reasonably sure they use Photoshop for their own excellent bird images, I don't use Photoshop so I can't say much about the product - only that you Gwentian Birders are rolling in money and all have that fancydan CS3

Considering you kept pushing me out of the way in your over zealous rush to get good shots of both the Cettis Warbler and the Bearded Tits my meagre efforts are as nothing as compared to yours, still I can only hope to try again when I've recovered!!! I've included a shot of a Whitethroat that I sort of managed to take when you was'nt looking.

 

[luke]

Great shots bill, but what about you pushing me out the way! It was great fun though.

 

[mike from ebbw]

Great shots both,sounds like you had a good day!

Luke CS3 is one hell of a big programme mate and not one I would want to start processing with.I have Photoshop Elements 2 and 7 along with CS2 and to be honest 99% of my shots are processed with Elements 2 as its a lot more user friendly.When you open the shots in Photoshop crop them as you want and then go to filters>sharpenand click it once.Then resize to the upload limit (800 pixels along the longest edge for BF) and go back to filters>sharpenand click it again as you lose some quality when downsizing.I get away with a lot of my shots this way and its a lot less complicated than unsharp mask.The best thing to do though is to open a pic and just have a play about finding out what does what etc.This is how I learn but it all takes time.If you want any help though and would prefer to be shown just pop down the house if you want.Gary is the master Photoshop fiddler though.