Harrold-Odell Lake Avian Activity

                A lake with abundant wildlife on the water, and close to shore, was where I was headed, and seeing a space on the main road outside Harrold-Odell Country Park seemed like a good spot to park, since I suspected the Car Park itself was likely to be crowded. My guess was accurate.

               Although I was planning to use my EOS R, and the Sigma 60-600mm with its 1.5 Converter, I still slung my LUMIX FZ10002 over my shoulder, and this was a good move, even though it only came into its own at the end of my visit.

               Once I had mounted the camera on my Benbo tripod, I was good to go, and first stop was the small area closest to the car park, where I could get an idea of what activity was on the main lake, after a short while there I then started a walk anti-clockwise around that lake, glancing through the trees to get a feel for what I was likely to find. A Black-headed gull had monopolised the now tilted post at the first stop, and as I ventured further, it seemed as if it was interested in featuring in photos, as I feel sure it was the same bird, that later I spotted gliding in search of a meal and every so often after circling, would swoop to the water, and then spend time in amongst the swans, geese and ducks, on the water amongst them.

               The swans some with young, seemed to be protective, but also in the distance with no young could be seen to be fairly aggressive amongst themselves! As a consequence the swan families and this gull feature strongly. In the case of the gull, I wanted as much panning activity as possible, so I was very grateful for his equal desire to assist. He (or She) put me through my paces, by often flying just by the treeline, which was certainly challenging! 

               Although hardly an attractive bird, the Egyptian Goose features fairly frequently as it is not every day that oneness them, but I have spotted one here on an earlier occasion.

               As I walked around, several times I spotted a species of almost colourless damselflies, but every one bar one never seemed to settle, so were too elusive to warrant the effort to photograph them. This lone one however seemed happy to stay close, so I brought out my LUMIX camera and attached the closeup lens then stretched out my right hand, palm-down in the hope it might land, meanwhile since I am naturally right-handed I gripped the camera awkwardly with my left hand, and contorted myself, such that I could hold it to my eye and operate the shutter with the same hand. It obviously felt I should be humoured having gone to such effort and duly landed on my free left hand, and patiently stayed there to allow me a couple of bursts, and at the end stayed put till I offered him a leaf upon which he could alight.

               This entire scenario was watched by a man in a wheelchair and his carer, who were seated nearby, so having succeeded in getting my shot, I showed them the result on the camera. They probably were convinced I was nine pounds short of a tenner! But I was really chuffed with my small success! Butterflies appear to be fairly trusting of humans, as this was not a one-off for me. I have also put seeds on my hand for Robins! Palm down, always.

Marsworth Reservoir Visit

After a meeting in the morning, I considered getting a few wildlife pictures, and finding Brogborough Lake closed, and later learning there was a windsurfing and other watersports activities up at Rutland Water which Sam was attending, I headed south towards Tring Reservoirs. On arrival, there seemed little activity on any of the three lakes, but what there was held some interest, I spotted a couple of Grebe performing their dance, but it lacked total synchronicity, and the pair parted after a while, but later I either picked up the same pair later or a new couple, but disinterest again soon set in.

Common Tern and black-headed gulls were swooping down on possible fish on Marsworth lake, but neither were around in large numbers, and I spotted a lone Tufted Duck, and also a Raven, which was very close by, on a very exposed branch. I got several shots of a single Lesser Black-backed gull as it came in to land. There were several Greylag geese, some with young families.

Later, a young Heron flew in from further along the Grand Union Canal and landed by one of the Lock Gates, then dropped down to a ledge at the bottom of the gates, and it was not overly wary of my presence which was a bonus, s/he did not abort the initial landing and later flew into the empty lock, where it seemed very interested in some nooks in the brick wall lining, but I never saw anything it may have caught. This was definitely the highlight of my afternoon as it seemed to accept my presence, so I had enough time to consider slowing the shutter speed to blur the leaking water that surrounded it. To try to discover just what was of such great interest, I took the camera off the tripod, crossed across the farther gates and lay down to avoid spooking the bird, to get a better view and try to learn what was so intriguing.

On my return to the car I met up with the Tringford Water Bailliff, Bob Menzies and a couple of other anglers, before setting of on my return trip, purposely avoiding the M1 and other major roads as I knew they were gridlocked.