Hide And Seek
A happy new year to all our readers with this weeks blog photo of one of my hides in a neighbours garden last month.This is what a proper hide should look like and I always have a good laugh at the hides that some of our television experts use – they would blow away in a force3 Hebridean wind!!!
I have spent thousands of hours in my hides over the last 44years and have filmed the nests of such mouthwatering subjects as Golden Eagle, Peregrine, Hen Harrier(62pairs!), Merlin, Gyr Falcon, Great Northern Diver, Short Eared and Long Eared Owls and best of all Snowy Owls in Alaska!!
Last months garden subject was a male Bullfinch eating pink Rowan berries – an easy subject compared to the other birds listed but just as enjoyable. www.facebook.com/gordonyateswildlife
Last weeks sub zero temperatures and sunshine were perfect conditions for filming Fieldfares – if you could find any! A Hawthorne bush in a neighbours garden was full of large red berries and out of the blue three Fieldfares descended to gobble them up. I had a memorable two days filming these and some other birds that turned up to enjoy the feast.
There is no doubt that the most illusive winter visitor to the Pennines is the Jack Snipe. Most people will never see one but I like the ultimate challenge. In the last two winters I have encountered 179 – all have flown off at close quarters and have provided me with no photos. All that was to change last Sunday when, in perfect conditions(Minus8C), I located a Jack Snipe, that froze, along a Pennine stream. I had plenty of time to take all the photos I needed and then go home for lunch.
I took this weeks landscape photo early one morning this last summer as I sat waiting for a Long Eared Owl to hunt.It seemed to me to illustrate what is now happening to our open countryside – one last refuge for the horses as the industrial sprawl encroaches all around! Next to where I was hidden were some Larch trees and in the tallest one a Kestrel was on the look-out for prey. Unfortunately it was continually harassed by Black-fly and did not stay long! www.facebook.com/gordonyateswildlife
Once again it looks like its going to be another winter with very few berries and even less Redwings. At dawn on Monday I found four Redwings, along the canal, finishing off the few Hawthorne berries that were left.It was the only day this last week when the sun appeared and their colours were transformed in the winter sunshine.
For three months last summer I spent time in the hills filming three different hunting male Long Eared Owls. They were memorable nights and I took hundreds of photos so lets have a look at some of the also rans.