Early morning nuthatch
The hide for passerines in Villanueva del Fresno was called 'The hide of the nuthatch'. And it was indeed often visited by nuthatches that offered photo opportunities in exchange fot food and water.
House sparrow reflected
During the calm morning hours the birds reflections in the water were quite sharp
A stop in the morning sun
The great tit makes a short stop before heading down to the water to dtink.
Who are you?
Cautiously the great tit goes down to the water to drink. Maybe it is the reflection that is seen as a contender?
Breakfeast with a seaside view
A nuthatch by the passerine hide in Villanueva del Fresno, Extremadura.
Drinking pause
After eating the food for quite a while, finally a great tit decided to drink. The reflection in the calm water became sharp and the morning light filtered through the foliage gave the scene a warm light.
Blue tit
The blue tit checks for threats before heading down to drink or eat.
Nuthatch
Maybe the nuthatch can hear the cameras in the hide? Something caused it to take a long look in our direction before it dared to move on.
The nuthatch is reflected in the water as it picks up one of the seeds used to lure it to the hide.
Drinking blue tit
That there were places that were more suitable for reaching the water didn't matter to this blue tit. If you're thirsty then it's the shortest way to go!
Ser dig!
Both the young blue tit and its reflection kept an eye on the photographers hide before moving down to drink.
Great tit
Great tit heading for a drink.
Young blue tit with reflection
Southern grey shrike
The southern grey shrike made a short stop in front of the hide where we were waiting for a lesser kestrel. It turned out that the shrike photos were the only ones that were taken during that hiding session.
Backlit white stork
The sun rose quickly in the sky so when this stork started posing in front of the camera you hade to to the best you could using the light as it was. In this case, it meant experimenting with different exposure settings on the backlit scene.
Cattle egret
Already an hour after sunrise the light is hard and the pictures easily gets flat. Not least white birds are difficult to shoot under such light conditions. Here the herons were lined up with the sun behind them, which gave some new possibilities with the backlight during the shooting.
Little egret
After breakfeast a mixed flock of little and cattle egrets has decided to take siesta in a place where they have a good overview of the surroundings. This is a little egret who has begun to preen himself without realizing that there is a photographer in the floating hide nearby.
With a flooting hide it was possible to get close to many birds as they were feeding by the pond. A flock of little- and cattle egrets kept me busy for quite some time as I could approach them to the close focusing distance of the lens. They stood on the north side of the dam so it was a great opportunity to practice backlight photography.
One of several little egrets photographed from the floating hide. It was a great opportunity to experiment with different camera settings to test the results with this backlit motif. Personally, I think the more underexposed images became the most interesting interesting.
Hunting duty
Little egret hunting.
On top
The little owl's favorite position underneath its nest
Heading home
The little owl is about to take off, heading for its nest that is locate overhead
Scary smile
With a little imagination it almost looks like a smiling mouth under the beak of the little owl. The extra mouth's 'smile' looks a bit scary I think...
