Leighton Moss... Afternoon Peregrine.

Last Friday afternoon found me back at Leighton Moss. I hadn't visited the saltmarsh pools for a long time, so by early afternoon I was seated nicely in the Eric Morecambe Hide. I was joined for the afternoon by a professional photographer, Andy Jones,who works for a national weekly cycling magazine and had recently returned from The Tour de France. We enjoyed a very interesting afternoon together discussing photography,birdwatching and of course the Tour de France.It was fairly quiet birdwise that is until a young peregrine falcon decided to pay a visit.
The peregrine caused panic stations amongst the waders and wildfowl present and everything was up in the air. It made a couple of passes over the pools and landed on one of the fence posts to weigh up the situation. It had another go but departed without actually making a kill and eventually normal service was resumed and the waders settled down to enjoy the afternoon sunshine. Andy and I were obviously trying to capture the action but found it difficult to lock on to the fast flying falcon and the fact that the very bright sun was directly into the lenses didn't help matters. However the whole afternoon had been a very enjoyable experience with great weather,excellent company and the exciting visit of the peregrine falcon. My efforts with the camera are shown above, the peregrine shots are poor and grainy but are a record of it's visit. Those of the waders are a little better, they show a lovely greenshank and a spotted redshank and a small flock of redshanks put up by the peregrine. The remainder of my visit was spent on the main part of the reserve at the Griesdale and Jackson hides and will be the subject of my next posting.