Peregrines

Urban peregrines! Right at the foot of my road – didn’t even know there was an eyrie there. My neighbour heard them and pointed them out to me. Couldn’t get very close, so had to compromise with a crop sensor and x2 extender on my 100-400 mm lens. Rather higher ISO than ideal at a forced f11 wide open. Adult male on a high perch. One young still in the eyrie, and the other out on some superstructure. Pigeons all around them – don’t seem to recognise what they are.

Birds

Lightning over Leith

Thursday morning, July 2nd, 1 a.m., the pyrotechnics started. I got up to have a look at it – see if there was any lightning strike I could have a go at photographing. There were! I went and got the camera, then got the tripod, then got the remote cord, then set it up, then had a think about settings. Then put in the settings. By the time I had it set up, the rain had come over and most of the lightning was above the clouds.

However, there was still the odd flash coming down. So, I stood there firing off 4 second exposures, trying to capture one. I was probably going something like 4 sconds on, 4 seconds off, 4 seconds on, 4 seconds off… It’s amazing how many of the flashes came during the offs – nearly every one. One of the best examples of Sod’s Law I’ve ever experienced.

Finally I got a good one, only to find I’d missed it off to the left, as the storm had moved round while I had been standing there firing off shots for the last half hour. I repositioned the camera and continued, but by now the storm was on the way out, and there wasn’t much more in the way of action. Here’s the best of what I got.

Around Edinburgh

Lochaber 2015

Ten of us spent a week of fishing Lochs Arkaig, Shiel and Lochy for ferox with wet fly.  Thankfully I caught one!  Some of the fish caught by others on this trip, and other trips to these waters can be found here.

Lochaber