January Recap

My photography in January this year has been very uninspiring. A combination of poor weather and a month long battle with a bad tooth infection has really impacted my photography. The seasonal wildlife has still been happening though, making the Berwyn’s a lovely place to live. Just before Christmas, the numbers of starlings flying past our property to roost further up on the Berwyn’s started to increase. I’ve been out with the camera a few times to capture the scene.

Hopefully I’ll be feeling it a bit more, to get out and photograph them more, on a few occasions the local Sparrowhawk has attacked the flocks, getting the flocks to swirl about wonderfully. Something I hope to capture next month.

We have had a cold snap, with a few mornings having a dusting of overnight snow. Not enough to make an impact on the images, but I did take a few images. One of the agencies I supply has a bi-monthly window to submit images, so I try to get a few images even though I don’t always feel it.

With the seemingly never ending rain, I noticed that the fat balls we were putting out weren’t lasting very long, being washed away. I set up a feeder in the stables, mainly to give the birds a rest bite from the weather. It also gave me an opportunity to get a few birds in flight images using flash. To get images using flash to capture movement it’s best to not be fighting natural light as that can cause ghosting in the image, making the stables an ideal location to take the images. I’ll do a more in-depth post about capturing birds in flight using flash soon.

As you can see, not a great month for photography, hopefully next month I’ll feel a bit more inspired.

Woodland/ Reflection pool

While we are enduring another battering from yet another storm, I thought I’d do a post about how I go about getting my reflection images of various animals. People often tell me I must be lucking to get certain images, or witness certain things, and yes, sometimes luck does play apart. But most of my images come about through planning. When I decided I wanted to get images like these, below.

I went about creating a reflection pool. The construction is easy and can be quite small, I would imagine if it’s of interest to you, most gardens could accommodate one. Mine is made out of a single sheet of ply, image below.

As you can see, our land is on a slope, so I dug one end of the pool into the hill side and levelled the sheet of ply at the other end with a pair of legs. The up stands around the pool are lengths of 3x2” and then lined with a pond liner. At the far end, under foliage now, is a bit of dry stone walling to create habitat for small mammals. The far end of the pool also has a layer of pebbles to just under the surface to allow small birds to drink and bath in the pool. The advantage of being able to dig the pool into the hillside is that it allows access to all sorts of animals, not just birds. For instance, each year frogs spawn in the pool, hedgehogs drink from the pool and virtually all my polecat photography has been done at the pool. Hopefully, this might give you a few ideas if you are interested in getting this sort of imagery. I’ll finish off with a few more images from the pool. I should note, these images are all wild animals that visit the pool and the photographs are either taken from a hide and long lens or in the case of the Polecats, a DSLR camera trap.

New Year

I had hoped to write this first post of the year a bit sooner, unfortunately an abscess just after Christmas and a few other events got in the way. Last year it has become obvious that my social media platforms were restricting the views that I am receiving. For instance, on my Facebook page I have 18,000 followers, but just a small proportion of them get to see my posts each day and I’m constantly being asked by FB for money, so they will show it to more people. If I post a link in my post for say my calendars when they are available, then my views tank even further. Each year I get messages from people that wanted to buy a calendar but never saw my posts. It also seems like Elon Musk is going to charge for Twitter, I’m just not in a position to pay a billionaire for something that was free. So I thought it may be a good idea to try and build a community here. Where I can share not only the stories of living with the foxes, Hetty and Charlie, but the seasonal wildlife on the small holding where I live, in the Berwyn’s of North Wales. As a wildlife photographer, I’d say that probably 90% of the images I take are now taken here, they are used by national newspapers, in books and by the likes of the RSPB.

As well as showing the seasonal wildlife I thought I could also show an insight as to how I get my images, wether it be using a DSLR camera trap, or freezing a swallow in flight as they nest in our stables. My partner Helen will also be writing the odd post, with subjects ranging from living with foxes to her felt creations. Hopefully it will be something you’d like to support. I will carry on using my social media platforms but will be scaling down the amount of posts to put more effort on this page. I’ve enable comments on this blog now so the engagement can be the same as on FB. I thought I’d leave you with a few images taken over the years at our place.

January 2023

I thought it might be a good idea to cover the wildlife and photography goings on each month of the year this year. At least 80% of my photography takes place at home in the Berwyn’s, North Wales and often, most of the images I take do not make my social media pages. Where, Rosie, Hetty and Charlie seem to be the most popular posts. It will also be something nice, to look back on in the future, if I can keep up to date on the posts.

Around Christmas time each year, Starlings start to use the valley our house over looks as a route up to their roost in a pine plantation on top of the Berwyn’s. While it is not quite what you’d call a murmuration in terms of the swirling flocks of birds seen elsewhere. We do get several thousand birds fly past over the space of half an hour every evening.

Sometimes, you get a wonderful sunset and the starlings turn up just too late.

January also saw some snow, we’re often often snowed in when it snows, so I make the most of what is available to me at home. That means Robins in the snow. I have a woodland hide and a feeding station for the birds, this makes them very tame and its not usually a problem to get some images.

Needless to say other garden birds got in on the act too.

Finally, an image each of Rosie and Charlie in the snow, Hetty was sensible and stayed underground in her earth.

Swallows.

Well, our pair of Swallows have finally left the stables, and what a terrible year it has been for them. Three times the female sat on eggs and three times, either the eggs failed to hatch or the youngsters died within a day. I have no reason why, the House martins have each successfully raised two broods, so I don’t believe it is down to the lack of insects. Maybe it is down to a build up of parasites in the nests, they use the same three nests every year, and have done for the past 10 years. Whatever the reason, it’s all very sad. In the 10 years we’ve been here we’ve gone from 3 pairs down to one pair. In that time we’ve done all we can to increase the biodiversity on our small holding, so I don’t know what the answer is.

Photographing the Swallows is always a highlight of the year for me. Between 80-90% of my photography is now carried out on our smallholding and that’s just the way I like it. Peace and quiet and much less of a carbon footprint. This year I didn’t take a single image of the Swallows, so I thought I’d illustrate this post with a few images from previous years.

This image was taken with a 15mm diagonal fisheye lens. To fill the frame the Swallow has to fly within a few inches of the lens. The camera is fired with a handheld remote control.

Another remote control image, this time using a 35mm lens.

The youngsters usually spend a few days flying around inside the stables and perching on the stable door, before they venture into the wide world.

Feeding time

Camera trapping Pine Martens in Scotland

Well it’s been a long time since the first post, but in an effort to not be so reliant on social media pages I’m going to resurrect this blog page. I thought to begin with, a few images of Pine Martens. Taken using a DSLR camera trap, on a recent trip to the Ardnamurchan peninsular in the West of Scotland.

Setting up the DSLR camera trap. Image credit Dan Trim.

As can be seen from the above image, a DSLR camera trap is different to a trail cam. Using a DSLR camera allows me to get high quality images, good enough to send to photographic libraries or produce prints from. I’ve seen a lot of over complicated DSLR camera trap setups on places like Youtube, it really doesn’t have to be complicated. I use an infra red trigger to fire my camera when the animal in question breaks the beam and a trigger on the hot shoe of my camera to fire 2 or 3 flashes to light the scene. You pre focus on the exact spot the animal will break the infra red beam (this can be done by triggering your camera using your hand to break the beam). Normally I like to use my camera in manual setting when camera trapping. A beginning setting would be iso 200, 1/250th shutter speed and F13. This should give you a black image when a picture is taken without flash. It’s then a simple task to gradually light the scene by adding flashes one at a time until you like the lighting. Flashes are normally set at between 1/16th and 1/64th power. A misconception is that the flashes will scare the animals. Over many years of camera trapping Mustelids (Polecats, Badgers and now Pine Martens) I can hand on heart say this is not the case, especially at the low powers I use flashes. Often my cameras have been triggered 50, 60 or more times during the night. I have also run my DSLR camera trap in conjunction with a trail cam when photographing Polecats, reviewing the video footage from that, the Polecats don’t even look up when the camera and flashes are triggered.

Below are a few images taken the other week.

The first camera trap image of the trip and a perfect pose. The blue hour sky a bonus.

Pine Marten investigating an old tool shed. The last image of 50 or 60 taken during the night. If you look carefully at the bottom left hand corner, you’ll see a smudge mark, caused by a Pine Martens nose as he investigated my lens during the night.

A slightly different angle, I love the way his paw is lifted up as he sneaks in.

Sneaking into a gamekeepers hut.

Coming in for a drink, balancing natural light with flash. I only had one night to work on this image, wish I had a little longer.

To finish off I thought I’d add a gear list of the equipment I use. Nothing sponsored, all brought and paid for.

Camera Nikon D800

PIR trigger and camera housing by Camtraptions.

Flashes and trigger for flashes, cheapest Yongnuo’s. Plastic sandwich bags to protect them from the rain.

A selection of cheap tripods or bank sticks to mount the flashes and PIR trigger. As can be seen, this way of photographing wildlife is a lot cheaper than buying a long lens. It also, in my opinion gives a lovely look to the image.

Welcome to my new website

Thank you for checking out my new website and blog. I hope to keep this blog updated as a sort of diary, it will feature wildlife photography, the changing seasons through the year as well as campaigning about issues that are important to me. Fox hunting, the badger cull and other environmental issues. I will always try to include some nice images if talking about a tough subjects so that it isn't all doom and gloom.

The new website came about because of the need to include a shop. This past year I've had lots of inquiries about prints, calendars etc and it's always been a quite drawn out affair to discuss requirements and payment details. I hope the shop feature will help simplify this.

I want to ensure any print I sell is of the highest standard and that I'm happy to put my name to it. I have decided to kick things off with a limited edition print. The image below has been re edited to ensure I'm happy with the final product and is printed professionally on a sustainable bamboo photographic paper. Having now already sold a couple I have to tell you I'm over the moon with the result. More details of this print can be seen in the shop section of the website.

For those of you who perhaps don't want to spend so much I will be bringing out open edition prints, calendars and cards. As the test prints come back they will be gradually added to the shop.

The front page of my website highlights some of my favourite images, separated into categories. You'll find the last category on the page is more of a fun page showing the foxes I'm lucky enough to care for often playing with our terrier Maddy, I hope you enjoy.

Thank you for taking the time to read my first post and I hope you stick around for the updates. There will be notifications on both Facebook and Twitter when they come out. Click the icons on the website page to be taken to my social media accounts.