UK Nature Blog

Bats over the water in the daylight

A family walk in the lovely Cassiobury Park, Watford, was much enhanced by seeing bats flying in broad daylight. It was the first hot day of the year, hitting 20c, and I wonder if that had anything to do with it, though I visit the park only rarely so for all I know they're out and about most days.

The first was hunting in a clearing in the trees by the river, about 20-30 feet up. The second, unless it was in fact the same individual, was skimming low over the canal, patrolling a stretch of a couple of hundred feet. I managed to get a video of the second, though a fast-flitting bat filmed at 12X zoom on a compact camera by an idiot like me does not add up to BBC HD quality results.

What sort of bat is it? I guess either a Daubentons or a Pippistrelle, the former being particularly noted for its water-skimming, though others sometimes do the same.

What drives bats to come out during the day? This academic paper gives a really detailed insight into daytime flying, but suffice to say it's not that unusual and it's probably to make up for poor feeding at night, or to take advantage of good hunting. Or one of many other possible reasons.

Winter is here

We can tell that winter has finally arrived because:

• It's extremely cold out
• Pools and puddles of water have taken on a hard, shiny appearance
• Winterwatch has been on tele, though sadly I've mostly missed it
• Snow has happened, with more promised for tomorrow
• This blog has been hibernating, but fear not, the occasional flurry of activity will occur
• The hits for the Fox prints in the snow post have gone through the roof, as they do every winter.

Children's Eyes on Earth - shortlist photos

There are 50 shortlisted images in the Children's Eyes on Earth photo competition, with public voting still open until midnight 25th September. The photographs are by children under 17, on the themes I Love Nature and I Fear Pollution, with the general idea being to raise awareness about important environmental issues, as seen through the eyes of these young photographers.

There are some really interesting and impressive images - it's most certainly not just cute animals!

Tatty Kite

This is easily the best shot of a Red kite that I've ever managed to get, with a backlit glow and reasonably sharp eyes (click the photo for a larger version).

It's a shame this bird is only just recognisable as a kite though. It's so tatty! The distinctive V tail needs a little bit of imagination to see, and the wing feathers aren't much better. I even had to think twice about whether it really was a kite or just a buzzard, but the length of the tail and those distinctive white patches on the wings make it clear. If I was better at this game I'd also be confidently talking about the wing shape I expect.

It spent a long time flying low and slow over Butterfly World near St Albans, giving me ample opportunity to snap away, albeit with only a 18-200mm lens at the long end (the photo is fairly severely cropped and not as sharp as I'd like). I wish I'd had my 400mm lens that day!

Woodland wildlife photography

The BBC has an absolutely brilliant gallery of woodland wonders, from the Woodland Trust's recent photo competition, as judged by Simon King. Definitely worth a look.

A photo of Venus ... technically

As you may have heard, recently Jupiter has been passing by Venus in the night sky. Venus is generally quite easy to spot - it's by far the brightest thing in the night sky (apart from the moon, naturally) and Jupiter was working its way past it on the left, heading downwards day by day.

After my recent attempts to photograph the moon I got cocky and thought I'd give Venus a go. You can see the thrilling results above. Somehow I don't think Brian Cox will be beating a path to my door. Jupiter is out of shot to the left. If I'd tried to get that into the frame you wouldn't have been able to see anything!

Catkins!

I brought inside a few twigs pruned from a willow in the garden and put them in water. Within a couple of days they had burst forth, covered in pollen. What a spring-timey thing!

The photography merits a brief note. This picture is taken indoors with a compact camera up close in macro mode. But importantly it's using flash and this has resulted in my intended effect of losing the background to blackness - even though my beige, flowery (but tastefully so) curtains are a couple of metres behind. Compared to the extremely brighly lit catkins the camera sees the curtains as near enough black and I get this wonderfully stark study.

Megawatt moonlight

I looked up at the brilliant full moon tonight and it reminded me of a Frank Zappa lyric from Be in my Video. As I occasionally do, I thought I'd frustrate myself by trying to take a picture of that moon. Tripod, Nikon D300, Nikon 400mm lens and this is the best I can do (with a little boost to contrast in post-processing). It looks OK in low-res here, but the lack of sharpness really bugs me. However it seems to be very difficult to do any better, presumably because there's too much turbulent, dusty atmosphere between me and it.

It's worth pointing out that the best result (above) was actually obtained by abandoning full manual, mirror-up, delayed exposure on tripod, in favour of automatic everything handheld braced against the window-frame!

Starlings pretending to be a dolphin

Thanks to Jenny for sending in this wonderful picture of Starlings flocking above Gretna Green motorway service station in late November. Apparently starlings do impressions - of a dolphin in this case.

I've never seen a truly massive flock of starlings doing their thing but I understand the noise is also quite something. More pictures of their swooping, wheeling forms via Google.

Autumnal scenes

A couple of pleasant and typically autumnal scenes for you, in case the darkening days are starting to get you down. Both of these are in UKNB's home town of St Albans, so if you're local you might recognise the first one at least.