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An individual, of no great importance, who is unable to see the natural world as a place for competition. I catch fish, watch birds, derive immense pleasure from simply looking at butterflies, moths, bumble-bees, etc - without the need for rules! I am Dylan and this is my blog - if my opinions offend? Don't bother logging on again - simple!

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Sunday 2 October 2022

More local sightings

The Churchill Tavern, Ramsgate, on Friday evening; Gareth Craddock and I spent an enjoyable couple of hours (and pints) chatting about various subjects which are central to both of our blogging efforts.  Over all too quickly we've made plans to reconvene for further socials as the traditional angling season moves forward. Gareth's enthusiasm is infectious and I'm now looking for the window of opportunity to get the pike rods dusted down. Canterbury & District AA have announced that Pike fishing will not be allowed until November 1st, purely because of low water levels and associated dissolved oxygen. Perfectly understandable following the catastrophic fish kill at Fordwich Lake earlier in the year. I could get a few sessions out on the flatlands yet feel far more confident of success if I take a drive down to the RMC. It won't require the detective skills of Inspector Morse to spot that my Stour Barbel project has been a complete failure. I'm bowed, but certainly not beaten, and will pick up that baton again at some point in 2023! In the interim I have one target that I'd like to work on. I'd love to land a "twenty" from the Stour as I only have one river Pike, over this weight, which I took from the Thames in the 1980's! 

A smart "pink tinted" Vestal which turned up this morning.

Garden mothing is improving slightly, as the overnight temperatures remain in  double figures (centigrade), but I've not seen any species visiting the Nicotiana plants since arriving home from Kefalonia. Wandering around the Newlands Farm patch it was nice to spot my first Stonechats of the autumn, when I counted five on the cauliflower crop along the northern boundary. Chiffchaffs continue to trickle through the Vine Close gardens and, this morning, there was a substantial movement of House Martins (800+) with a smattering of Swallows (60 - ish). They were first seen moving north before a definite switch to a westward direction which ties in nicely with the sightings that Chris Hindle reported at Reculver Marshes.

Quite a bit of gardening needs attending to and while I've been pottering around the camera kit is always close to hand. I'm happy to play with various settings in an attempt to improve upon the images captured previously. The digital format allows me to click away at any subject I wish. Those dodgy efforts can provide just as much learning as those which are clearly very much better than my EOS 400D was capable of capturing.



2 comments:

  1. Digital pictures are today quite incredible Dyl, by any standards. And as for the raptors? Us older observers only have to think back fifty years to the days when Kestrels hovering along the M1 was about the score. A single Sparrowhawk I saw across school playing fields early 1973 was I understand, in the London area, quite a record. I doubt if the Starling which got blattered at the end of the flight quite understood what a privilege it was to be there.

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    1. The technology involved in capturing digital images continues to evolve at a mind-numbing rate. That Nokia are able to market a phone which has a 41 million pixel picture capacity speaks volumes about this aspect of photography. I'm just happy that I don't have to pay for film to be developed before realising how poor my camera work is. Obviously, every now and then, I do manage to record a decent image and for that I'm truly grateful.
      As for the demographics of raptor populations in 2022? I wonder how much is due to the removal of DDT from the agricultural arena and the effects of climate change? As always, cheers for taking time to comment, take care - Dyl

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