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Here’s a little background information. It was taken on Elmley Marshes National Nature Reserve in North Kent, an area I have been documenting for the last 15 years. Conditions such as this are not all that uncommon over there where, with the combination of freezing winter temperatures and fog, rime frost is formed and produces spectacular conditions in which to photograph. Having spotted the image I had to work quickly as the sun was rapidly rising and burning through the mist. With the camera secured to a tripod and set to its maximum height, I had to stand on tip-toe to prevent the fence posts from merging with the land.

Nikon D2x, 12-24mm @ 16mm, 1/15 sec. f16, iso 200, 0.9 ND grad filter, Manfrotto 055 tripod, mirror lock-up, cable release.

 The image was used full page in an extensive article I wrote for Practical Photography magazine on Discover Winter Wetlands. The article can be viewed here.

Sunrise over Elmley Marshes

Those of you that follow me on facebook (that’s where you will get my latest news on projects and workshops) will know that for the last month or so I have been attempting to photograph barn owls. A permanent wooden hide is in position and so far my efforts haven’t been rewarded as much as I would like. Activity at present is quite sporadic so I’m hoping that with the possibility of young to feed in late spring and summer, I’ll have stronger pictures to show here. 

Lapwing numbers are incredibly high at the moment reaching several thousand strong on the marshes. Courtship displays have already begun and once again I am sure I will endeavour to record this aspect of their lives. Due to all the rain, breeding condititions are good too with lots of pools and flooded areas throughout the area.

Northern Lapwings in flight

Lapwings will take to the air and form long, tightly packed flocks, gradually gaining altitude if approached by a bird of prey such as a marsh harrier or peregrine falcon.

Reedbed

Shortly after sunrise on a perfectly calm, misty morning, I began shooting general views and close-ups of a reedbed.

A small pool behind provided a clean backdrop.

In order to retain detail in the highlights and obtain a high contrast, graphic image, I exposed for the background then stopped down 1 1/2 stops.

All these reed images were taken hand-holding a 300mm f2.8 lens, something I don't often do when photographing plants as I prefer to use a tripod. But, due to their location, rapidly changing light and the fact I could activate the vr, I was confident of securing sharp images.

On the way back I noticed a pair of swans and lay on the ground with the 300mm f2.8 resting on a beanbag. It was still quite misty which not only injected atmosphere into the scene but cut down the overall contrast.

“I’m determined to increase my coverage of invertebrates of the North Kent Marshes, obtain more landscape images of the South Downs and attempt to photograph wild boar.”

Roll on 2011!

Looking towards The Seven Sisters, South Downs National park.

Barn owl

Although barn owls can be seen quite regularly throughout the North Kent Marshes, their movements are rather unpredictable, preferring large expanses of rough grassland and marsh as opposed to following the predictability of a reedbed. Indeed, many of the top barn owl images you see today have been taken in Norfolk where their population densities are greater than here in Kent. 

Over the last week I have secured permission from the land owner to place a couple of permanent hides on the site so, with Christmas and New Year out of the way, normality can resume and I can start work on attempting to get some half decent images of this beautiful bird. I’m not sure I can produce anything better or significantly different than what has already been done but I’ll certainly have fun trying! Over the last few months I have seen short-eared owls regulalrly use this site as well as marsh harriers and hen harriers so I look forward to spending many cold mornings and afternoons in my hides.

These woodland scenes were taken at a local nature reserve called Cromer’s Wood, just south of Sittingbourne. I’ve been a voluntary assistant warden here since it’s conception in 1990 and although not a huge area (62 acres) it does have some very interesting plant species as well as a large pond where, amongst others, sparrowhawks occasionally come down to bathe. 

Nikon D300, 28-105mm, 5 images stitched using PTGui Pro.

I deliberately kept this image light to accentuate the graphic lines of the grasses.

Freezing fog regularly occurs on the marshes and as I drove along a track early in the morning I noticed this pair of pheasants feeding on a hawthorn.

Here in north Kent we had a severe dumping in the early hours of Thursday morning so the following day I headed off to the marshes to see what I could get. At the entrance to the reserve a covey of red-legged partridges scraped the ground to find food. They formed a tight group and it began to snow providing me with a window of opportunity.

Nikon D300, 300mm f2.8, iso 400, aperture priority, 1250th sec. f4, +1 exposure compensation, beanbag over car window.

I drove on a little further but it soon became clear that as well as I know this area, I would be foolhardy to continue as I couldn’t make out the difference between track and marsh.

A month into photographing a pair of nesting marsh harriers, I accompanyed two very experienced ornithologists, Rod Smith and Brian Watmough who were hoping to find a number of nests in order to wing tag the young birds. This is a relatively new practise and 2010 was only it’s second year. Initially, ringing the birds was the only option but of course the only time data could be collected was when the bird was deceased. With wing tagging however, simply looking through binoculars can inform you both of it’s origin and year it was tagged. It is therefore far easier to collect data such as age and where it goes throughout the year. One bird, for example, that was born on the Isle of Sheppey, has been seen in Lincolnshire! But why I ask myself should a bird leave an area that has an abundance of food and fly 100+ miles? Just one of those things I guess.

If I remember correctly, 4 nests were identified as possible sites to tag the birds. The first 2 revealed nothing even though I had myself been photographing the parents bringing in food to one of them. This isn’t unusual however. Reedbeds are so dense that visibility can be just a metre or so and when you have a large area to cover, regardless of how much you have pin-pinted it’s location, you can quite literally be on top of it and still not see it. After around 30 minutes they decided to move on to allow the parents to return and resume feeding. On the third nest, we got lucky. As I stood, some distance away from where they entered the reedbed, I could see a huge pair of wings flapping among the reeds. A sure sign they had located the young and were now in the process of gathering them. 

Three, four week old Marsh harriers being brought out of the reedbed by Rod Smith (who is pin-pointing its location on his GPS) and Brian Watmough.

Once brought out they were taken to the car where both ringing and wing-tagging would be carried out. Two tags were attached. A blue one which indicated the year (in this case 2010) and a white one which indicated location which in this case was for the Isle of Sheppey, Kent.

As I looked on I could see how experienced Rod was in doing this. Totally confident in the way he handled them and maneuvered the birds to get them into the position he needed.

Blue tags for the year.

And white for the location.

After exactly an hour (to the minute actually according to the image EXIF data) they were taken back to their nest. I had never seen a nest of a marsh harrier before so upon borrowing a pair of waders, I followed.

I was instantly amazed just how deep the water was. At at least 2 feet deep it was the ideal place to keep the eggs and young safe from predators such as foxes.

Upon reaching the nest site I had just a few seconds to get pictures since as soon as the birds were released, rather than modelling perfectly in the centre, they scattered in all directions!

Immature Marsh harriers in nest.

I have to say I was a little disappointed with the nest. I had visions of a monster structure, perfectly entwined amongst the reeds. Instead, it was a simple nest of flattened reeds. But it was practical. It served it’s purpose, which afterall is what it’s there for.

It was a perfect conclusion to two months spent photographing these magnificent birds of the marsh and with approximately 30 nests on Sheppey, it looks as though they are going to flourish for many years to come. Hooray to that!

Marsh harrier carrying prey. Full frame. No cropping.

The image below has been cropped considerably so you can see exactly the prey it was carrying. A young rabbit as it turned out.

Considering it was taken at iso 800 in order to get a fast enough shutter speed, I am extremely happy with the quality the Nikon D300 produced.

Male bringing in another young rabbit. Other prey items include marsh frogs and birds, from lapwing to coot.

A long-shot showing clearly the outline of this fine bird. Broad wings and tail giving it plenty of buoyancy and maneuverability. Unlike other birds of prey, marsh harriers aren't put off by inclement weather. I have witnessed them in the rain, howling wind and snow quartering reedbeds.

The final image is one of my favourites. It’s all about the wing positioning with the late afternoon sunlight illuminating it’s underside. Although not the fastest birds they were quite hard to track. Indeed, when you are in a hide, your vision is restricted and so I would go by the mobbing calls of lapwings to alert me of their presence. I would then frantically look through each peep-hole to try and locate it. For all the images a 300mm f2.8 lens with either the TC-14EII (1.4x) or TC-20EII (2x) tele-converter was used on a Nikon D300. Stopping movement was the prerequisite so I selected an iso of 400 or 800 (depending on how late in the afternoon I was shooting) and the camera set to either shutter priority or manual.

Female arriving at nest

It was a wonderful experience witnessing and photographing marsh harriers from such close range and even with the amount of preparation involved, I am sure in the future I will attempt to improve my coverage of this stage of their lives. In the next installemt I accompany licenced handlers ring and wing-tag the young birds.

Male marsh harrier 'floating' over reedbed. Nikon D300, 300mm f2.8, iso 400, 1/2000 sec. f7.

Instead, I opted for positioning a 4 sq.ft. wooden hide, approximately150m from the nest, making sure the parents returned, then left it for a week to give them plenty of time to get really used to it. I then moved it closer at 20m intervals over the following week or so until I was around 50m away. This was done once myself and photographer friend, Phil, were happy that the young had hatched. How did we know the young had hatched? Well, during incubation the male brings food to the vicinity of the nest whereby the female, who does the majority of the incubating, then flies up and catches the food which the male drops, known as an aerial food pass. When both parents were bringing food back on a semi regular basis, we knew the eggs had hatched. This is very important since there is a much stronger bond between parents and young as opposed to when they have eggs.  

Male marsh harrier

Male bird.

With the hide being 50m from the marsh harrier’s nest, this may seem like it is still an awfully long way away but in such an open area it literally feels as though you are on top of it! Also, if I work too closely, when the birds are flying around the adjacent reedbeds, I would have to tilt the camera up further than if I were working from a greater distance. The marsh harrier pictures you see here are from the first few sessions. Time of day and wind direction played a vital role. Photography was only possible first thing in the morning and late afternoon when the sun was low in the sky so as to illuminate the underside of the bird. And, if the wind direction was blowing from the nest site to me, the birds would fly away away from me as such large birds prefer to fly into the wind giving them greater maneuverability so as to accurately land on or near the nest. I wanted side or head-on shots so needed the wind to be opposite to this. As you can imagine, this often limited hide sessions to just a few visits each week. Thank goodness the young remain in the nest for around 40 days! In the next installment, pictures of parents with prey.