Wildlife photography... The Camera

Why do I bother? Last year I splashed out on a compact digital camera (henceforth known as "The Camera") with a 12 times optical zoom - one that would fit neatly into a pocket - so as not to have to take the BIG camera out whilst out walking the dog - because I was fed up coming back from a walk, digging the phone out, and explaining to my wife that the tiny blob on the screen that you could just make out was, indeed, a deer, or such other distant piece of wildlife.

So this year, whenever I've not taken The Camera out with me I've seen some cracking wildlife. In the snow of January, a fox in the middle of a field. March, a red kite overhead. May, it was either a red kite being mobbed by a buzzard or the other way around.

We'e also got a pair of Oyster Catchers nesting on one of the drainage ponds for the A1M, but that's not why I'm writing.

It's the pair of whaups. The glorious curlew has decided to nest in this vicinity.

So of an evening when I go out and walk Loopus, I hear the most fabulous birdsong that I know - the curlew's call, and see them flying through the air.

However, they know, like all wildlife, just when I will be carrying The Camera. They stay away. All last week, I didn;t take The Camera out, and all last week, in the evenings, there they were, flying overhead, warbling that wonderful song.

This week, new memory card, thus new incentive, took the camera out - they didn't appear. Not even a whisper. Not once.

Then tonight, I didn't bother with The Camera, I took a bottle of beer instead. I'd got 100 yards into the walk when:-

"Whau-whau-whau....!" The pair of them, overhead!

Here's some lovely video from someone else.