Osprey's & More !

Horn Mill Fisheries - 26.07.2023

An acquaintance of mine who lives in North Wales asked me if ever fancied going up to Aviemore, Scotland to photograph Osprey ?...."how long dose it take to drive up" I ask...."7 hours"....nope ! You don't have to drive all that way, you could just drive down to Rutland and photograph Osprey at Horn Mill fisheries...that's what I did.

So this morning I'm at Horn Mill Fisheries on the River Gawash a commercial fishery once owned by non other than Rodger Daltry of the band The Who to photograph the "English" Ospreys. The fisheries under an agreement with a local Osprey Trust leave one pond un-netted to allow the ospreys in the region access to fish. When booking you have the choice of either a morning or evening session, or for that matter both when the fishery is non operational, I choose just the morning option for no other reason than to avoid traffic on the drive down.

Visiting Horn Mill there's basically three target species you should try to include, obviously Osprey, Red Kite that scavenge dead fish and the iconic Kingfisher, but today really it's all about the Osprey. Not having done this many times I'm finding photographing Osprey a real challenging subject to get any decent images, especially the diving shots...basically I'm rubbish, but as they say practice makes perfect.

Get ready !....the Osprey's sat in one of the trees to the left of the pond surveying the trout cruising just below the surface, then after a lot of head bobbing it eye's it's target and dives...boom hitting the water with some force you would think must injure the bird, success or not, it takes maybe just 4 or 5 seconds from leaving the tree to hitting the water...it's that fast !

Failing to get the dive shots you always have the "back up" option of the action when the Osprey leaves the water which is the easier shot. 

After maybe 5 to 6 dives and a lot of waiting around, this is where the Kingfisher's can keep you occupied, it's all over by 8.30am as the activities of the fishery bursts into life discouraging further Osprey fishing.

Got to be better than a 350mile drive !

See you next year.

Osprey

Red Kite

Kingfisher

Grey Heron

This heron caught a large trout which was way to big for it to swallow so it abandoned on the bank only to be grabbed by a Red Kite.

A New Experience

River Gawash - 30/31.7.2022

I've always wanted to photograph Osprey's a summer visitor to the UK but I could never contemplate the long seven hour drive up to the Scottish Highlands, but wait there's another option Rutland, and it's only just over an hour and a half dive...cracking !

A new experience for me, Osprey's in flight in low light ! all the wrong conditions you would say to get any decent images but I'm prepared to give it a go. I'm at River Gawash Trout Fisheries located a couple of miles from Rutland Water which has a population of re-introduce Ospreys breeding in the surrounding area, the fisheries under an agreement with local wildlife groups allow the Ospreys to take fish from a single un-netted lake, the fisheries in-turn have provided a hide charging photographers for the privilege.

I have two sessions arranged, one Saturday evening and another on Sunday morning. The evening session starts in not so good light pushing the ISO high, very high so I decide to use try the 70-200mm f2.8 wide open to get some reasonable settings, of coarse at 200mm is way too short, anyway after a couple of visits I begin to understand what's required, here's a few images.

Sunday morning is an early 4.15am start and it's still dark ! only at 6.30am the light is reasonable but the wind is such that when an Osprey makes a dive it fly's off into the wind in the opposite direction...hey ho ! but I did manage some nice images of a juvenile Kingfisher to ease the disappointment.

 

Osprey

Kingfisher - juvenile