A spring in Natures step...

It's been a wonderful few days here in Cheshire as I spent a few hours on the coast last weekend and ended soaking up some early Spring sun and one place I head to when by the sea is not the beach but the sand dunes. I always head there as it's the warmest place when sunny especially behind the dune grasses and there's slight a wintry breeze blowing from the sea. It was lovely to see so many people enjoying the weather and I even loved seeing a pair of Turnstones walking by my feet while furiously trying to be the first to get all the goodies left by the sea. 

Once I returned home and headed off to my local wildlife hot spots it was amazing to see and hear so much of spring kicking off. From Ravens cronking, Nuthatch calling, Swans building nests, Toads and frogs laying frog spawn and today the smell of Fox filled the narrow wooded trails as I walked along and as the sun beamed down on me it created such a wonderful scene that made me feel so happy. Even in my garden the Blackbirds have built a nest behind my garden shed, the female has been very busy collecting moss from gravestones and the pots where I grow reeds in the summer months as they love to use the roots to bind there nests.

More to come I hope as I can't wait to get going as I really love this time of year!!!

Regards

Mike

Sharing locations of wildlife signs and activity, Good or bad?

Every now and then I get asked by locals and wildlife groups where and when is the best place and time to see wildlife locally. I have in the past seen and experienced the effects of sharing this information so in this post, I'll be sharing a few incidents which happened within the last 10 years.

The first experience that went wrong when sharing information was with a fellow wildlife photographer that I took to photograph a family of Badgers over one summer. I asked the person not to go there without me and not to take anybody there as this may draw unwanted attention to the sett and if the wood was entered incorrectly and left with no disturbance, this was before the Badger cull was ever put into action. One summers evening when the light was perfect I went to have a few hours of peace at the sett. I arrived hoping for peace and Badger cubs chirping but I was met with peanuts littering the area and the trusted photographer had taken another person there without my knowledge.

 My trust in the person was lost and it took me years to relax back into my routine at the sett as I felt that at any moment when the Badgers had trusted me enough to feed and relax sometimes a meter away from me could be disturbed at any moment. I felt like through trusting somebody else with the Badgers location I had put them in danger and would never get the special moments I once had before telling the trusted individual. After a few years, the Badgers and I relaxed as the individual that was trusted moved away and the wooded sett were returned back to me and the Badgers once again.

After this experience, I knew I would have to be selective and think about who and what information I shared with people or wildlife groups as this can have effects on Nature beyond our thinking.

A few years later another person was trusted as I asked for help when gaining evidence against person/persons committing wildlife crimes. This person then went to a relative without being asked who turned out was an acquaintance of the person/persons I was gaining evidence on to give to a wildlife crime officer. I'm guessing the relative of the person I trusted went to the person I was gaining evidence against and told them they were being asked about. So because of the person Id trusted did not think about the consequences of there actions the evidence stream we were using was lost and the trail we were following went cold. More recently I have managed on my walks to capture and begin building evidence from the field on a few individuals committing wildlife crimes ie. linked people, car reg, places visited, times active. It's through the experiences above and a few others I have not mentioned that I have shown me I cannot take the risk of trusting people with too much of my local knowledge as it can be turned around agasit the creatures I have vowed to protect. Now I follow a new set of rules and over the past 2 years, it seems to be producing results which should come to fruition this year.

I trust people in everyday life and use the idiom "Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me"  I'm not one to distrust everyone I see or talk to but if it's regarding nature unless I see the protection of a creature/habitat to much for me to protect myself then I manage it myself or make use of a trusted family member to solve a situation. For example, let's say if a sett comes in danger from people involved with the cull and I can't disturb them or distract them from there awful acts then I would get more people involved within the field of the Badger cull preventers to aid me.

So I can choose who I trust but I cannot control who they trust and who they trust because who knows somewhere along the chain they may just have a relative or friend who  is an air rifle wielder and like staking shots at nature for there own gratification and for me I'd rather not take the risk.

I hope this makes things a little clearer to those people who ask me to share my sightings and locations. When I'm not working I spend most of my time outdoors with nature so its a big part of my life so I don't take my decisions lightly when it comes to protecting Nature and our beautiful countryside.

Regards

Mike

A new local find :-)

With local wild places becoming crowded and closer to becoming developed with housing and various other plans. I decided to search in some new places outside of my usual wild places to find some quieter and more undisturbed places. I spotted this Fly agaric Mushroom at Shakerley Mere last Tuesday and the area is becoming one of my favorite weekly places to visit.

I have even found this perfect picnic bench by the lake with a perch where I can place some bird food and enjoy the birds coming back and fourth while I relax and enjoy the outdoors.

 I found this hidden spot which I will be exploring more the next time I visit and I will take a few more photographs of my wildlife findings and habitat.

I love wooden bridges over trickling streams

 Tonight I am trialing a new WiFi camera setup tonight in the garden. I am powering on 12vt mobile backup battery which is nearly lasting an hour which is perfect. I may even see some of the 16+ hedgehogs that pass through my garden looking for food each night which may be a record. A few are hibernating in the hedgie houses in the garden already but more are visiting lately. Luckily not many get squished very much on my concrete island and there main predator the Badger whose numbers are 0 on my local urban patch. As well as filming wildlife I'm hoping to use to catch a few poachers out with this new kit if I can run on a 3G network created my Iphone.

Thanks for reading my blog
Stay wild, be happy and be safe

Mike

A new mount for my Action camera

This week I put my sowing skills to use making my Action cam 2.0 wrist mount for filming close up wildlife encounters when kayaking. I am hoping to use with underwater in a waterproof housing as well if the sea is warm enough in September. Updates to follow on how well the mount works.

Thanks for reading my blog

Stay wild, be happy and be safe
 

Mike

Bees under the pond

A few weeks ago my brother noticed a few Bees buzzing around the pond so we decided to watch and see where they were going. We discovered they were going under the plastic of the pond and being no danger and knowing bees are in decline we decided on leaving them to go about there beesiness :-p

I'll try to photograph them to see what species they are as they are quite relaxed especially as the colder evening air comes in.

The entrance to the Bee hive under the Pond

Below is a few photographs of the rest of the garden as the trees we planted have really grown quite big this year and as I added some reeds and willow to the pond and an old fish tank its looking rather beautiful. I have no need to go out into the woods some days as we know have a small woodland in the garden. We should get quite a few birds in the winter now we have some proper branches to hang the feeders from.

The trees in the middle of our lawn are getting quite big 2 are Rowen trees and the other is a....

Our Pond from another angle (Red circle is where the Bee hive is located under the logs)

Our little wildlife area by the shed where Foxes, Hedgehogs and the shier birds can relax

Our little Bee hive Pond with our willow tree getting bigger

Hedgehog houses and bird bath reed area

 Anyway I must be off as I'm going for a long bike ride by the river Weaver where there is a Great crested grebe nesting in the perfect spot to get some wonderful photographs without disturbing, if I'm lucky there will be chicks hatching there soon.

The death of Flash :-(

Today I thought I would post about one of  my local patches characters and in this instance its Flash one of the local Mute Swans who had a territory here for over 16+ years. We last saw him in February this year when he was fighting with a new pair of swans. On the 11th February my brother separated them and put Flash in a safe place on the river away from the danger of the attacking pair. After that he disappeared and since then we had no clue where he was. Last week we got an email saying he was reported dead at Middlewich on February 14th 2016. He was a wonderful swan sometimes grumpy but yet very calm and intelligent. He will be sadly missed..........
Below is a video I made about the life of Flash

As a wild bird he did his job protecting his mates & cygnets over the years. I shall miss him swimming along side me in my kayak as the sunrises on a warm summer morning along the canal.

I took this photograph in the beginning of 2002 when he had one of his first brood of cygnets

One of his last broods a few years ago..

He was quite a poser

Flash at his main nest site which he held for many years without fail

Flash by the big lock pub

Thanks for reading my blog

Stay wild, be happy and be safe
 

Mike

Foxes from summer 2015

After going through some of my unpublished blog posts I came upon one from the summer. High up in the Conwy mountains we enjoyed many long and warm sunny days watching a family of Foxes living on a ledge which looks out to the Irish sea. We watched them playing, sunbathing and hunting below is a few photographs I took of the family members coming and going.

In this photograph one of the Foxes watched us from below as we ended up sitting on the top of a hill so we could see the Foxes below and the sea behind us. This meant we could enjoy the sun, watch the Foxes and keep an eye out for Dolphins on the sea.

We did not see any Dolphins on our June trip but on our September trip while heading to a local shop with no cameras. We decided to take the scenic route up the Little Orme and down to Angel bay to see if we could have any wild encounters as well as soak up the sun and views I love so much. A few meters out we spotted 30+ Bottlenose Dolphin breaching which was an amazing site. Seeing a beautiful creature off our coasts means more to me than seeing them in tropical waters in other places where there more commonly found.

Thanks for reading my blog

Stay wild, be happy and be safe
 

Mike

Picking up the Shag skull and a chance encounter

A few years ago I found a sea bird skull on a secluded beach, I think the skull is from a Shag and I left the skull as it still had feathers on it so I placed it under a rock so it could decompose more. I had to climb down a rocky hill using a narrow path down to a very rocky beach with no sand, I use this same area to swim with my Easybreath mask on as there is some great sea life here which I am yet to fully film due to setbacks. I am hoping to go back for a few days in July to see if I can get one more chance this summer to film underwater if the weather is warm enough.

As I already have a Cormorant skull which is a similar bird that often get confused when Identifying them. The Cormorant is slightly larger that the Shag but the beaks and skull designs are pretty much the same.

  One of the views available from my swimming spot

This Kestrel turned up to hunt for Voles in a grassy area just above my secret bay

A Shag with a view

Some photographs from different angles

One of the sunset panoramas I took on my Iphone on the top of the Little Orme

 I visited the spot again before we left North Wales as I got the opportunity to try and film underwater but I could not fully submerge myself due to some late summer visitors to the Irish sea.

Thanks for reading my blog

Stay wild, be happy and be safe
 

Mike

Sea birds at Llandudno

One thing I love about my June holidays at Llandudno is the opportunity to checkout the Sea bird cliffs off the Ormes headlands.

ABOVE VIDEO TO SHOW SOUND FROM THE COLONY
There are a few things I like to make note of 1.How many birds there are 2.How far into the breeding season are the birds 3.How many birds per species and how mixed in they are. This year the Cormorants, Kittiwakes, Razorbills and Razor bill all seemed to have some birds of each species at different stages of breeding. One thing I witnessed was due to the strong winds the Guillemots were struggling to get up to there higher nesting areas so some days they had to land on a lower rock shelf till the wind calmed. I saw a Guillemot land in a Kittiwakes nest accidentally and once the bird returned to it's nest the fighting began. The kittiwake grabbed the Razorbill and pulled it off the ledge and made sure it flew off.

I think the bird on the left is a Kittiwake either in Winter plumage or a Juvenile

Some mating was going on in the colony

 I just hope all the birds have finished nesting before they reopen the climbing here as I believe that there may be a few birds still on nests with chicks and any disturbance could disrupt there success this year.

Some of the areas of rocky shelving where the Birds used to nest have worn away meaning they have to either move on to some where new or they integrate with other species on other nesting shelves.

The Kittiwakes were bringing in large amounts of sea weed while cormorants collected sticks above

One thing I love about visiting the cliffs is to have all the sea birds coming back and forwards to there nests. Having all this over your head with them giving calls as they return to there mates with food for them or there chicks.
2 Guillemots flying out to sea to catch Sand eels

One Guillemot loops around to try and land as the sunrises which lights up the cliffs waking up the sea birds which begins an epic chorus that is one of my favorite natural sounds.

Thanks for reading my blog

Stay wild, be happy and be safe
 

Mike