Waxwing

Waxwing
"To see a world in a grain of sand,
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
And eternity in an hour."

From "Auguries of Innocence"

by William Blake

Thursday 22 March 2012

Pheasant Photos - for Chris

Chris from Las Aventuras (please see link to his blog on right hand side of page) mentioned in a comment on my last post that he would love to see a photo of a Pheasant in the wild.

The bird I spotted yesterday was in the middle of the field and too far away to take a picture with the 70 - 300mm lens but here's a couple of photos I took in January last year at Ladywalk Nature Reserve where a male and female Pheasant were feeding under the feeders. It was my first outing with the lens I had just had for Christmas so the photos were some of my first attempts - husband adjusted the contrast on Photoshop at the time to try and make them better!

Pheasant (Phagianus colchicus) Male




Female Pheasant





I will try and get some better photos when I am out on my travels and if I ever manage to visit Norfolk I will try and get pics of Golden Pheasants.


Spotted my first greenfinch of the year on the garden feeders this morning - the first garden sighting this year!

8 comments:

Ian said...

Beautiful photos of beautiful birds.

Ragged Robin said...

Many thanks Ian.

Rohrerbot said...

Wow wow wow!!!! I love you! What gorgeous birds:) A long long time ago, I remember pheasants from my childhood. I have an investigation planned for when I return home this summer on what happened to the pheasants of my hometown. These shots are gorgeous and I really appreciate you posting them. Big fan of this bird. You are so lucky to have them in your wild woods. Hope you have a great Friday. Chris:)

Ragged Robin said...

So glad you like the photos Chris - they are beautiful birds. When I relooked at the photos they weren't quite as bad as I remembered them :D!

Had a strange moment yesterday - just after doing the blog posting I went for a drive round some local lanes with my daughter. A pheasant suddenly flew straight out in front of her car and she had to slam the brakes on to avoid it. Luckily it escaped unscathed!!

I hope you do a blog posting on your investigation on pheasants in your hometown - it would make interesting reading.

Have a great day and weekend.

All the best

Caroline

ShySongbird said...

Well done with sorting out the moths on the previous post Caroline, now I know why I still haven't taken the plunge and bought a moth trap yet ;-)

Lovely photos of the Pheasants! Funnily enough I looked at your post yesterday but didn't have time to comment as we were just on our way out. We went for a walk along a bridle path and were constantly teased by a Pheasant (or Pheasants) which kept appearing on the track but just too far away for a photo, I thought of you each time :-) Then on the way home one just escaped death as it ambled across the road in front of an oncoming car!!!

Ragged Robin said...

ShySongbird - Be warned about moth traps - they become very addictive :D!. Sadly my id skills of the worn lbj's show little signs of improving :D! Its amazing the amount of species you can catch though and totally absorbing. I have to limit myself to once or twice a week as I spend so long potting and identifying!

Glad you liked the pheasant photos - was glad I found them because, as you say, they are often too far away to photograph. What a coincidence about you seeing a pheasant too that just escaped a nasty end by car! I often see pheasants on the route we took but normally they just walk through the hedge into the field not fly across the road!

Dartford Warbler said...

Beautiful pheasant photographs.

We have seen very few greenfinches this winter and wondered if they have fallen foul of the disease that has been affecting them. Lovely birds. I have missed them.

Ragged Robin said...

Dartford Warbler - Many thanks - glad you liked the photos.

Very few greenfinches here too - I haven't seen any diseased birds but you do have to wonder if they have been affected by this.