Today was my last day at Yew View this year, yet we are already thinking forward to all the exciting things we are going to do in 2016! It has been an amazing year on site and I am sure 2016 will bring even more exciting footage and projects.
With the sun making a rare appearance today, I headed down to the Niger feeders to see if I could set up a Bushnell cam to get some footage of the redpolls and also to possibly grab a couple more photos of the redpoll with my DSLR as last week, the light was awful!
I used the Manfrotto clamp arm to set up the Bushnell, with the 60cm lens on. This clamp is brilliant as it is possible to position the trail cam in just about any position you want! I carefully measured the distance from the lens to the feeder, so any birds that visited the lower perches of the niger feeder would be in focus…. now it was just a matter of waiting to see the redpolls would oblige and sit right in front of the camera!
I left the Bushnell there for a couple of hours and was pleased with the results. These are screen captures from the videos..
The goldfinches are not keen on sharing and there is always a lot of jostling for prime positions on the feeders!
Hiding behind a post, I managed a few shots of the visitors with my DSLR..
Checking the other trail cams, I discovered that a lovely Grey Wagtail had chosen to land on my mobile Bushnell perch I had set up by the ornamental pond…
It is always a bonus when you discover a clip of a species that you had not expected!
Finally, another unexpected capture… a Sparrowhawk landing on the Kingfisher post at about half 4pm. The camera had gone into IR as it was dusk…
I will be returning to Yew View in the new year and I’m very much looking forward to another wildlife-laden year at this wonderful site!