Today in pictures

[gpick24]

You need a licence to photograph them here (near there nest). Must admit though, if I saw one on a branch, I would risk it.

[davemac]

Originally Posted by mobertol

Today's set around the farm. Is this little chap just a grass snake? I hope so! Lots of loads of cement have been coming in constantly over the week and you can see a lot of progress in the additional cow-barn. It will soon be ready to house another 100 new milking cows. They have baled up the alfa-alfa and wrapped it today as they'd let it go over into flower (the nice purple field of the other day) so it's not top quality hay. Mirko and Alessandro are the tractor guys and I've put in a few photos of the builders - funny how there's always one working and a couple looking on The final photo is of an "Ape cross" which is used by Christian -a disabled guy who works here part-time.

For a short period the Parks dept. had one like that, only ours was a Piaggio, it was prone to go onto two wheels on tight corners. Also until wagons became the norm we also used 3 wheeled Bonza trucks for working within the park, if you overfilled them with soil and drove up the hill in Oak Hill Park they went on two wheels, but the back two.

[DaveinGermany]

Originally Posted by gpick24

You need a licence to photograph them here

Eh? What kind of guff is that?

[gpick24]

Originally Posted by DaveinGermany

Eh? What kind of guff is that?

Not posted a link with tapatalk before, hope it works.
http://www.wildlifelens.co.uk/kingfisher-photography/

[Margaret Pilkington]

See.....you learn something every day on here.
I never knew that. I have never seen a live Kingfisher in the wild.....though some years ago I found a dead one at the bottom of Union st in Accringon.

[Margaret Pilkington]

Today we went to Southport.
There willbe some pics later, but right now they are still in the camera.
They will need to be picked over and resized.
It was the Orange Day Parade....so the place was packed.

[Accyexplorer]

A few random landscape pics from my trip to silverdale

DSCF3139.jpgDSCF3150.jpgDSCF3154.jpgDSCF3169.jpgDSCF3189.jpgDSCF3217.jpgDSCF3231.jpg

[Margaret Pilkington]

Here are my Pics of the Protestant Orange Parade in Southport today

[davemac]

Originally Posted by gpick24

Not posted a link with tapatalk before, hope it works.
Photographing Kingfishers | Wildlife lens

I have never come across Natural England before, so don't know who they are responsible too. And support what they say about approaching nests and disturbing them. However there is a bigger picture here, we have a legal right to take photographs when we are located on publicly accessed land, be it town or country, and to photograph all things visible from that land. So the question is if I take all precautions to protect the breeding zones of the kingfisher and am located on publicly accessed land, under what authority does this group have the right to say I have to have a licence, and who polices the nest sites to make sure this happens. Don't particularly want to get into a debate about the rights and wrongs of this particular licensing legality, but more the right to take photographs when I am out in public.

[Margaret Pilkington]

Natural England - What we do

This gives some information about the organisation.

[gpick24]

Originally Posted by davemac

I have never come across Natural England before, so don't know who they are responsible too. And support what they say about approaching nests and disturbing them. However there is a bigger picture here, we have a legal right to take photographs when we are located on publicly accessed land, be it town or country, and to photograph all things visible from that land. So the question is if I take all precautions to protect the breeding zones of the kingfisher and am located on publicly accessed land, under what authority does this group have the right to say I have to have a licence, and who polices the nest sites to make sure this happens. Don't particularly want to get into a debate about the rights and wrongs of this particular licensing legality, but more the right to take photographs when I am out in public.

I agree with you Dave, and as far as i`m concerned, if i`m there i`ve already done the disturbing (accidentally), what harm does taking a photograph make.
I`ve read on other sites that the sound of a cameras shutter is enough to scare off a kingfisher, yet i`ve heard locally that one of the best places to see them is under the M65 motorway bridge, doesn`t really make a lot of sense.
I suppose it`s down to what they are used to. If you are on a well walked path, they are used to seeing people so you aren`t disturbing them. If you go somewhere a bit more secluded (Hyndburn Brook spring to mind), that`s when you may be causing an issue.

[Margaret Pilkington]

Originally Posted by gpick24

You need a licence to photograph them here (near there nest). Must admit though, if I saw one on a branch, I would risk it.

Me Too...it would be too good a chance to miss.
If they are there, and I am there...it is purely coincidental. I would not go looking for them specifically and I would never disturb nesting birds knowingly.

[davemac]

Originally Posted by Margaret Pilkington

Natural England - What we do

This gives some information about the organisation.

I did follow the links and found its an umbrella group to encompass all the other groups working in the field of countryside, biodiversity, Bat protection, Badger population control, and many more groups, it is however directly responsible directly to the Secretary of State.

Originally Posted by gpick24

I agree with you Dave, and as far as i`m concerned, if i`m there i`ve already done the disturbing (accidentally), what harm does taking a photograph make.
I`ve read on other sites that the sound of a cameras shutter is enough to scare off a kingfisher, yet i`ve heard locally that one of the best places to see them is under the M65 motorway bridge, doesn`t really make a lot of sense.
I suppose it`s down to what they are used to. If you are on a well walked path, they are used to seeing people so you aren`t disturbing them. If you go somewhere a bit more secluded (Hyndburn Brook spring to mind), that`s when you may be causing an issue.

I know of one haunt of the kingfisher that lives within an area set aside for paint-ball activity, yet maintains a hole in the bank despite all the noise and excess paint balls littering the "battle ground", another is a man made structure right next to a footpath, so perhaps they are a more robust species than we think. As you walk a lot of the same regions as I do perhaps these are the ones you are also referring too.

Without getting into a rant about the countryside and the policing that occurs to keep it that way, no one as far as I know has ever attempted to stop the motorbike scramblers that disturb more than kingfisher nests, and are active on more public footpaths as time moves on, yet the damage does not get challenged, and is more destructive to the biodiversity than I ever would tip toeing up to a kingfisher nest to take a photograph. Something I think I have a legal right to do. Right pre-rant over, I must now post my pictures before I run out of time.

[davemac]

Today in Pictures, wet bits akimbo.

1. The countryside now has a brown tinge to it as the grass goes to seed.
2. I have stood here through different seasons, and every view is a pleasure.
3. You can see the brown tinge to the grass as it moves in the breeze like a morning mist.
4. Seeds waiting to leave home on the next gust.
5. We have entered the digital age, its Digi-talis.
6. Someone left a gate open, and all the wickthings escaped.
7. The disappearing jetty, it get less every year.
8. I tried to identify thith, but couldn't so ith a moth on a thithle.
9. Time for the uphill part of the way home.
10. A last look back, with a possible look of rain in the air.

[shillelagh]

took this on Thursday ... was so far away that we didn't know a rabbit was behind the heron till I put the photos on the computer