After visiting Bolderwood, we headad back down the road and stopped at the Knightwood Oak. This 400 year old tree is believed to be the oldest and biggest oak in the New Forest. You can just about make out Sue standing in front for scale!
First of all apologies for the lack of blog post and comments on your blogs but I was away in Portsmouth and then the New forest until Wednesday and I was doing various things yesterday. I took over 700 photos, which isn't bad considering the weather, and have various posts to come on my trip, but I thought I'd start with where the trip started: Portsmouth. On the Sunday, after staying the night at a friends, we went to the Blue Reef Aquarium on the Portsmouth shore front. Taking photos there was pretty difficult, especially in displays where using flash isn't allowed. Of the UK species on display I only managed one ok shot: this one of a triggerfish
Here is the second part. First up are the photos I took with my trusty Panasonic fz7. A juvenile little grebe posed in front of us while I was trying to digiscope, so I whipped out my camera and got these
Its been atleast a week since Ive been to Regents Park, so it was time for a visit. First up, of course the herons. Adults were a bit thin on the ground, for Regents Park anyway. The chicks are growing fast, some might even be fledging soon, judging by there size!
Today I went for a wander around regents park. Activity at the heronry was the same as it has been recently. No sign of any chicks today, but I'm sure there are some up there. Hopefully when they get a bit bigger ill be able to see there heads poking up over the top of the nest. The first interesting thing I saw after walk on from the heronry was a pair of ruddy shelducks, one of which is shown here:
I start today with and admission. I missed something. Apparently some eggs have hatched in the heronry (I wasn't aware any had been laid!) and according to the writer of regents park birds chicks have been heard. Thers no reason to doubt this as this guys obviously know his stuff and I believe surveys the park in the mornings when its quieter. Anyway on with the report. The light was awful, as the fog never lifted so no photos of herons on the nest. However a foriegn school group turned up and the herons descended from their nests
The latest trip to Regents Park was on saturday. A quick inspection showed a few herons on the nests. Not as active as previously seen. But this wasn't the most interesting thing going on...