Update

Adder Neonate

Just a quick update... Unfortunately I have had very little time lately to get out there with the camera, apart from the odd one or two snaps for work. It has been very hectic at the BWC, which is great of course, plus I have been and am working on a few little projects for work and my photos. I will bring news of them when they are complete.

I have had quite a few people ask about snow photos, so I will do a post with a few of those in a week or so. 

I also wrote a blog post for "Foto-Buzz" the other night, and will do a straight copy of that to here with a few extra pics in a few days time.

Finally, I have one more photo to take of Albus for this years antler growth series. He is in tatters at the moment, so should be completely clean come Friday when the next photo is scheduled. I will most likely put all the series up here, with just a few choice ones on the main blog to show the growth  of the antlers.

Very small baby Adder

Anyway... Three of the last few pics I took are here. The top one and one above show one of our baby adders... Look how tiny they are! Neither are that great, but both show how small they are with one curled up on a bramble leaf to bask in the sun, and the other at the base of a fairly small log on the sand.

Water Shrew, Neomys fodiens

And a water shrew portrait I got the other day for a blog post that never came to. The shrews are exceptionally difficult to photograph where they are... It is dark, they are constantly moving, it is through glass in a tiny vivarium. This was the best I could manage.

Not to get too technical, but this was taken at ISO 3200 on my D300s. Yes it is a little noisy in the background, but any lower and the image would have been blurry. A lot of people are wary of pushing the ISO up, but I would rather have an image with a bit of noise than no image at all.

Thanks for looking.

Adders

Adder, Vipera berus

With the excitement of baby adders at the Centre, I thought I would share a few adders photos, old and new.  Most of you will know I have a soft spot for adders... they have a very bad reputation. They are fairly docile animals, and tend only to bite if agitated or disturbed. But then I think most wild animals would do this.

Above is one of my favourite newer portraits of a male adder.

Male Adder

And this one you may have seen before, one taken of a male while they were dancing. Well, the other two were, this one was more interested in me and ended up crawling over the camera to see what I was doing.

Female Adder

This shows of the coloration of the females quite well. Males tend to have more contrast in their bodies... a paler sandy/silvery base with a very black zig-zag markings. The females show less of a contrast, with a brown/copper base and a dark brown zig-zag.

Adder Neonate

A baby adder! Not from this year, this was from the last litter we bred here about three years a go. The females tend to breed ever four or five years, but it can vary. We a very slow intake of food it takes a while for the females to get back in to good breeding condition.

Adder Feeding

One of our adders feeding on an adult mouse.

Dancing Adders

One of my favourite portraits of our adders. This is actually of two males dancing, but difficult to see that. This was taken a few years a go now.

Fish-eye Adder

And last for this post, one that didn't quite work out... I was trying something with my fish eye lens, and got close to why I wanted, but still needs more work. I will try again next year as it needs to be done when more inquisitive, i.e when dancing and less wary of other things going on.

Thanks for looking.

Owl Awareness Day (Yesterday)

Fly Over

Apparently it was International Owl Awareness Day yesterday... That one slipped me by! Never mind, here are a couple of owl photos in any case.

Big Pete flying above. 

Tawny Owl

Florence in the evening light, this photo is being used for a section in my talk next week.

Evening Barn Owl

I believe this is one of our old owls, Tutoke, taken a few years a go now. I liked the tree in the background.

Nessun Dorma

 Florence singing the opera :-)

Close Up of Archimedes

Close up of Archimedes.

Short-eared Owl in the Snow

Fawkes in the snow.

Long-eared Owl Peeking

And finally, Archimedes peeking around the edge of a tree.

Thanks for looking.