Spoonbill up close and other birds at Waverhoek with the Sony A7riv and 200-600mm
Full screen gallery below
So a few weeks ago the weather turned and the first weekend was like a real spring weekend with sunshine, warmer temperatures and all that combined with nice golden evening light. That was the thing I needed for my next tests and experience with the Sony camera and lens. It really was a lovely evening and while it started of pretty quiet and boring even. It came together at the end of my time at Waverhoek.
Like I said it started of quietly and struggled to get this little waterbird in a good composition and sharp. It stayed pretty much in one place, just feeding and walking up and down the water’s egde, turned out to be a Redshank (Tureluur - Tringa totanus). I learned that I need to still up my shutter speed to 1/1000s instead of 1/500s for slow moving birds. Additionally I’m now shooting with a gimbal head on a tripod, lets see how that will work out - will get back to this in another post.
Moving on to an area with hopefully more interaction with some birds, a kestrel (Torenvalk - Falco tinnunculus) flew over. I snapped away and got a decent photo of its wingspan. My birds in flight photos need work, but it is so much easier with the Sony over the Fujifilm - sorry Fujifilm - just is! Not much later a couple of Eurasian curlews (Wulp - Numenius arquata) also passed me - bang got em!
I ended up at the other side of the meadow at the waterside where larger bushes and trees are situated and in the reeds saw a common reed bunting (Rietzanger - Emberiza schoeniclus) and futher a (one of many these days) Common Chiffchaff (Tjiftjaf - Phylloscopus collybita) up in the trees. Can you find it, hidden amongst the leaves?
Walking a bit further I saw and captured my first Common linnet (Kneu - Linaria cannabina) up in the trees. What a lovely colourful bird! I think it sat there for at least 10 minutes. So I had plenty of time to compose a shot. However it just sat there, just behind a branch, so I really struggled to get the best perspective, but still very happy I could get this photo. Hope to see this colourful small bird more in the coming period.
Then the cherry on the cake at the end of my walk together with a lovely golden evening sun. A Spoonbill (Lepelaar - Platalea leucorodia) flew over my head and landed at the water’s edge just 20 meters in front of me. Lucky me! This gave me time and flexibility to really observe this lovely bird and also to choose my composition(s), so I was a very happy birder! And with a Lapwing (Kiviet - anellus vanellus) also flying directly over my head I managed to get a very nice bird in flight shot as an extra! This was a good evening.
For now the photos. All shot with the Sony combo! And don’t hesitate to leave a comment or an e-mail. Click to view larger in a light box and navigate with mouse or arrow keys. Enjoy!
