tis a bit odd using a 100 to 400 up close, but it will AF down to 1.8M which is about the distance to the spa from where i sit to snap them
most of the yard snaps are under 5 M and most of the critters are small
it does seem to work well enough to put up with swinging a 2.76kg lump of technology to hunt a few grams of critter
* glass might be the generic name for the see through bit on the front of a camera, however, most of the lenses in my ones are not glass but some sort of optical quality, human made crystal
Interesting although I would dispute their claim that fluorite; calcium fluoride, is a rare earth material. It may not be a common material, but calcium is certainly not rare earth.
For some reason the rooks were being very noisy yesterday. Couldn't see why, but they were making a lot of noise, but not in an alarm type of way. Got scolded by the wren again when I went down the garden, but strangely not when I was working near the nest, but the next raised bed over.
We had an interesting wildlife evening on Tuesday. We were coming back from a meeting and went across country; rather more than we meant to as the road we needed was closed, so had to take a partly unmade side road. Saw a couple of hares, and I think a couple of rabbits, but they shot into the undergrowth, so only saw part of their rear ends. There was a young roe deer on the unmade road, and as we went straight up to the woods as we were firing 2 kilns yesterday, we saw a young badger going across the track in front of us. Didn't know they moved that fast! Also think I saw a pair of jays yesterday but not sure as they went straight over me so only saw the underside. I have seen jays in that tree though, so they may be nesting there.
a scampering badger is surprising quick and agile for a plump looking beast with shortish legs
watching them go uphill quickly is very impressive
having a young one steal my bacon butty from beside my "im not here la la la, im under a blanket" saluki and a foot below my hammock was my closest encounter
one that was rather odd, i was being very quiet and rather professionally blending into the landscape in a very dark bit of slopey woodland when i knew i was not alone and whatever it might be was close and it had not noticed me, yet
then there was the sound of someone or something with a sinus issue eating silverskin pickled onions(without the smell)
crunch chew, crunch chew chew etc
i was a little nervous, although it was obviously not what i was hunting which was potentially dangeroos
after ten or fifteen mins, whatever it was finished the snack and ambled away with a slight swoosh of vegetation and some heavy breathing
it never noticed me
next day i eyeballed the scene, dug and eaten bluebell bulbs(i thought they were toxic) and a couple of badger paw prints
it had lunch about 5 feet away from me and did not know i was there
i dont know if that is about badger awareness or how to be invisible
either way it is an excellent noise, if a bit freaky at the time
after typing that i popped out to top up the bird feeders
seeds, seeds and sunflower kernels
there was a stirring about 3 feet from where i was sitting
after a few single seed deliveries from 18" reducing to finger end distance, mousey was eating a couple of inches from my hand and acting in a very relaxed way until a pigeon got clumsy trying to land
wow, another hand tame one
i really must read up on, and play with, the video capacity of the camera,
that would have been a nice bit of footage
as it was, it was a really nice critterhuman shared moment
Although I have no reason to believe there was anyone at home, my 'close encounter' with badgers was when I fell down a badger hole in the New Forest. I was camping with the Guides at Foxlease and a few of us had been taken out 'badger watching'. I am not convinced the leader knew what she was doing, so we did the whole trip in total darkness. Sadly, I fell into a badger hole on the way back. Hurt my back a bit, which made sleeping on the ground with only a sleeping bag (kapok in those days) and a ground sheet rather sore.
We have a couple of large sets in the woodland complex and several 'outliers'. They seem to be used mainly in the spring, and our theory is that the males either find the youngsters too much of a pain, or get thrown out by the nursing sows so go to the outlier sets until things settle down at home.
That is also a thrush technique. I remember a poem we had to do for O level about ' thrust and bounce and a ravening second' or similar (it was a very long time ago).
We had an alert from one of our cameras in the 'yard' yesterday evening. When husband and son looked it was a roe deer trotting through. Unusual as they don't usually trigger the camera.
, well.
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