Harold-Odell Country Park

Wednesday dawned bright and crisp, and the car which overnight had been encased in a thick frosty coat, was slowly warming in the bright sunshine above the low lying mist, thawing the windows from the rear of the parked car going forward.

The mist was also burning off though more slowly, and the sky above was a cloudless blue, which enticed me to consider a trip out to record life on the lake to the North of me at Harold-Odell Country Park. I had a leisurely breakfast, by which time the last of the frost had thawed making it a matter of moments to clear the moisture from the front and rear screens, and a swift lowering of the front door windows to clear them, before heading northwards. The only heavy traffic encountered was on the section of the A421 currently narrowed and speed-restricted from the M1 Junction northwards till the dual carriageway.

When I reached my destination there were roadworks just before the turning for the car park, so I parked on the right before the entrance in the small very muddy lay-by. It is was at this point that my day’s luck ran out. Somehow my car key had been damaged earlier in my pocket, and I found that I was unable to use the open switch on it, and using the key manually left me no means by which I could open the boot! Add to my annoyance, my alarm sounded as well due to the delay in discovering that I had to turn that off whilst the key was in the Ignition! It took some while for me to work out a way to get around this Snafu! My woes did not end there, as I had left my monopod in the house, and it had my tripod head on it, so all my shooting was going to be handheld. It was therefore a blessing that at least the exposures were going to be fast enough for my long lens.

Before entering the Park, I wanted to get some shots of the lingering mist and the distant churches before the sun burned this off, and even as I was taking these the mist was lifting, and the distant scene was crispening.

I had hoped I might see Grebe on the water, but they were nowhere to be seen, gulls and Mallards were in the majority, and swan families were reasonably numerous too. Along the margins inshore I kept spotting a Robin, but it was too flighty, rarely still long enough for me to get a focus, before it was off elsewhere.

I only stayed long enough to capture a few representative shots, before it became obvious there were no new views to be had.

Another afternoon with the 2x Converter

Once again it was a time when I used the 2x Converter on the already long 60-600mm Sigma Sports lens, and found its performances to be excellent. For most of the time the lens was at its extreme length, but since for the greater part of the time the sun was out, so the ISO speed was not excessive, so Noise was not a major issue.

Initially the plan was to go to the nearest lake in the hope, I might get better shots of the resident Woodpecker, but it was not in residence, and nor were many other birds, in fact, I have never seen it so bereft of birds. The total tally from my observation, was a single Swan, and a lone Coot, and the trees were not alive with the sound of music of any species of bird. Even the Cormorants of which earlier there had been at least half a dozen had forsaken the Lake. Also, considering the surprising abundance of Buddliea bushes in full bloom, I counted only three butterflies having walked the complete perimeter of the lake, a couple of Dragonflies two bees, a wasp and just two small hoverflies. The absence of so much indigenous life seemed very surprising, especially since there were only two anglers, and no activity from powerful cars, normally the background sound emanating from the Millbrook Motor Testing Circuit.

I found that dispiriting, but the walk around the perimeter, with short forays towards the shoreline at the myriad Swims was good exercise and taken at a good pace. It was so quiet on arrival, that I had not even bothered to take a camera with me, and the only two possible candidates worthy of recording were a pair of dragonflies, who unpaired shortly after they arrived close by, and sadly had I attempted to take any shots, they would have been unexciting, since they were either on the planking of one of the jetties, or on the rather scrappy ground leading towards the water’s edge.

I had not even taken the camera out of the car, so I returned an headed northwards towards Harold-Odell Park, what I had not anticipated was just how hard that journey would become. I headed off in what should have been the most direct route, when unexpectedly I found myself being redirected, but after three aborted attempts, I simply decided to continue heading North until fortunately I reached a point at which I was allowed to cross the main road that was being resurfaced, and the workmen handily told me I would be able to return later via the same crossing point. As it turned out there was a way to avoid the blockage when I later made my return journey home.

Having parked in the lay-by outside the Park, I assembled the EOS R with the 60-600mm Sports lens and the additional 2x Converter, because I knew that unless I was lucky with birds that were close inshore, most of those I was interested in would either be on one of a couple of peninsular arms coming into the lake or be keeping their distance from the shore by remaining in the middle of the lake. My main interest was in seeking out the Grebe who called this home.

Quite early on, I spotted a pair of juveniles still with the remnants of the stripes they were born with, and they were enjoying each other’s company, as they zig-zagged their way up and down the middle of the lake. A while later I spied a much younger complete family with four young Grebelings where the father would head off in search of small fish to feed his youngsters while the mother kept her eye on her young foursome, at one stage the father would help a couple of his brood onto the mother’s back whilst he sought out their fish supper. The Grebe is one of my favourite aquatic birds because of their wonderful courtship routines, and their enchanting nurturing of their young. Their skill in fishing is also to be admired as they dive beneath the surface for freshwater crawfish on the bottom, or the small fish they catch and sometimes regurgitate fo their very young and  then the larger fish for their partner or themselves. They also keep themselves well-groomed.

Even though I kept the Converter attached the whole time during this visit, no shots of the birds came close to filling the frame, so I am really pleased with the quality I was able to achieve — I was stunned at how good the shots of the hovering Black-headed gull turned out considering how small they were in the frame, and considering how high the ISO was too. The EOS R body really makes the most of this Converter, and is surprisingly good at retaining focus with this Sigma Lens. I cannot praise enough this coupling of this EOS R body, lens and Converter. When you mount this on a firm tripod, such as this Benbo I use, the combination is a real joy to use, and when you see the results on screen later, it is just so rewarding.

Yes, I was disappointed not to be shooting the Woodpecker, but seeing the Grebe family behaviour was really a privilege to witness, and to capture it at such a distance means that the shackles on my wallet are loosening with outing I make, so shackles look to become shekels in the hands of Sigma.

Harrold-Odell Country Park Birds

 

I now had the EOS R mirrorless camera and Sigma Sports 60-600mm lens back, and was keen to set everything up again, and also having learned from Canon how to shoot sequences with breaks in shooting, without the interruption of the saved files in the viewfinder until I needed to review the captured images. I did not find it as fluid as when using a conventional DSLR, but with practice I believe I will manage to master it. When you learn how to set this up, it is straightforward, but I had to find the setting by asking my Canon Guru!

Now if I need to review the image I click Preview rather than have to wait as the sequence is displayed in the viewfinder, when what I was trying to do was continue shooting once an action continued. Thus far it is not as fluid as my earlier experience with a mirror flipping, but I am hoping I will master it with more practice. One piece of advice offered was to slow the frame rate, but that would seem counter-intuitive, but I will explore all this as every opportunity arrives. What I have already found is that the quality of the captured images exceeds that of the earlier lenses due to the reduced camera shutter vibration and the larger inherent file size; in other words the image quality exceeds what I previously achieved. Another factor also comes into play in low light levels; the image brightness improves both the cameras ability and mine to focus accurately.

The adapter to use my existing investment in lenses is yet another benefit of the move to a mirrorless body, but it has been a steep learning curve, and as yet I do not have the fluidity I experienced with my earlier bodies (and my brain is older, and less tractable!) My own body has a similar issue with my wonderfully stable Benbo tripod, whose weight is a severe issue when travelling on foot for any distance!

On this trip the only bird that was in any way special was a lone Grebe, but the trip was mainly an exercise to gain confidence in the mirrorless body and the Sigma 60-600mm lens, which I fulfilled albeit not spotting the incorrect setting of colour temperature, which fortunately I was able to sort in ‘post’! I still have further settings to reinstate, but for anyone considering the change to the EOS R, fear not.

Autumn Sun in Priory Park Bedford

Last time I attempted to capture the colours of Autumn, I was thwarted by the ever-shy English Sun – however when an opportunity arose again, I made my way to Priory park in Bedford; the only adversary on this occasion was my intransigent SatNav, which would bow out when I needed it most which involved me in more than one loop back to take the correct direction at a junction. Even when nearing the Car Park, it was insisting it would appear on my right, but fortunately I spotted it myself on my left, albeit too late resulting in a U-turn at a nearby junction.

I was greeted by a very milky sun, but as forecast, it slowly cleared and was pleasantly warm with not a breath of breeze to ripple the water on the lakes. After a brief conversation wit a couple of ladies by the map, I set off for a walk around the lake with just the 5D MKIII and the 35mm f/1.4 lens. I headed for the water's edge before crossing the green sward to a stand of multicoloured trees in the near distance. After a few brief glimpses beyond the frontage of cover, I headed back to the path that ran around the lake's edge, taking every opportunity that was offered for further trips down pathways into the woods to my left, which resulted in other small pools under heavy tree cover, and small bridges over streams or gullies.

I continued these forays throughout my trip around the lake before returning to my start and changing cameras and lenses at the car after taking the opportunity to eat a Scotch egg and a packet of crisps. I would have liked to have used my monopod with my long lens, but sadly, the 3/8th to 1/4 screw adaptor was stuck firmly and I had no tools to extricate it to attach it to the lens foot. I also swapped the 35mm lens for the Tamron 90mm Macro and took the anti-clockwise trip and returned the way from which I had just emerged with the 5D MkIII and now the 150-600mm around my neck. This time only retracing a third of that side of the lake before making a different route back to the car.

I had covered quite a lot of ground and had found the Canoe Slalom Course, but without its teams of canoeists and met numerous dog walkers and mothers and grandmothers of very young children with a mere handful of fathers, and countless joggers and strollers with earphones firmly excluding the sounds of the wildlife from their hearing. There were also the occasional young businessmen discussing their day's business meetings as they made their way around the lake as well as a few small family groups at the water's edge feeding the ducks and gulls, or using plastic ball throwers to keep their dogs exercised. It was only towards the end of my trip did I spot any birds that my camera could consider capturing.

It was a very relaxed interlude with several tunnels of trees to capture bathed in warm autumnal hues and casting long shadows through the branches of trees still fairly-well covered in their foliage, but as I walked I witnessed numerous flutterings of leaves falling to form the golden carpet that covered the paths I was following, every so often I would turn around and take shots from the opposing direction when I spotted the new view from the other side.

I wondered just how long before the wind and rains of the oncoming winter would be upon us.