In reply to DB_Fife:
Regards
Kathy and Dave
Oh well, back to wet miserable weather again. I actually remembered to take camera and small lens with me on our regular morning walk - weather permitting. Saturday was a little nippy, but bright.
This brightly coloured fella, sat in a tree on a residential street, allowed to get reasonably close i.e. within 10m. Still small, with a 300mm lens.
Cropping out gives a very pleasant image.
Another cropped image
At tail end of walk, I spotted a large dot in a tree a long way off. Was it a Wood Pigeon, Red Kite, Carrion crow, Raven...? With lens fully out at 300mm, there is more of a clue.
A Buzzard, basking in the morning sun and intent on something beneath it.
90% luck, 5% field craft, 5% camera skills.
In reply to Angus M:
Super shot of the Greenfinch DB, and lucky to get one on your feeder. I only ever see them at a distance. Well captured ...
Great shots of the Goldfinches Angus. They always remind me of young children - rushing around in small groups, always looking busy. I like how you say you had a small lens on - 300mm, that's my longest ...
Thanks all.
Ah yes, my 300mm lens (secondhand Sigma 18-300mm) is what I take when I don't want to lug 'The Beast' around. It give me a nice range from wide angle to a reasonable zoom. I hauled it up and down Mt Snowden last year.
This morning's stomp around Moor Green Lakes and nascent Longwater Road nature reserves (a gentle 2 miler) required 'The Beast' i.e. Sigma 150-600mm contemporary. It does enable me to get this - though the bird was kind enough to land on a branch quite closes to me on the Blackwater footpath.
Edited post [After consulting the RSPB pocket guide to British Birds, 2nd edition, the Memsahib and I have decided it might be a Cetti's Warbler. I just about recognise it a a warbler; my bird recognition skills being terribly wobbly.]
Thanks to IsaRobbo for identifying this as a Chiffchaff. Though in my defense, your honour, the piccie in the RSPB book gives this bird quite a greenish hue. I guess one give away that is it a Chiffchaff are its dark legs. Yer live and learn.
First, to give scale, an uncropped photo.
Cropping out
And another
It flew off.
The opinion of the jury as to what this beastie is?
Matches the google pics for Cetti's Angus!
Edit: Sorry to have misled, Google Lens indicates common Chiffchaff as posted by Robbo!
2013 photos & vids here
eff37 on Flickr