cold fish breakfast

This was the brilliant sunrise I snapped at 7:20am this morning. It looks pretty fiery but trust me - it was damn cold! I'm not a morning person at the best of times.

At the yacht club at 7:40 am the cloud cover hadn't broken so it was still a little dark and the wind was freezing. This heron had just caught himself a substantial breakfast but a cold fish didn't tempt my tastebuds.

By the time the clouds broke up and the sun began to shine reliably my fingers had frozen and I was in serious need of a coffee. I had achieved a couple of decent photos despite the low light conditions and I was wide awake and ready to start painting. I photograph the herons so often I have decided I should actually paint them for a change. Thats my challenge this week.

Hounds and Herons

There were lots of people out enjoying a sunny morning on the side of the river yesterday. Below is "West" who brought his owner out to throw some sticks for him.

I think half the reason I can get close to the birdlife here is because they are used to the human activity which will probably increase as people utilise the awesome new walkway the council has put along the stopbank.

I have noticed very few herons on the riverbank in the last couple of months. This one is pulling out a big long mudworm to eat. Many of them have had chicks which are just now leaving the nest and I saw this family squabbling on the mudflats the other day. The herons with fuzzy hairdos are the juveniles. The smaller of the two young birds was hassling a parent for food and chased it until it gave in and regurgitated some food into the chicks mouth. EEEYEW! Makes you grateful you didn't have to rely on your mother to...er....nah lets not go there. Then the smaller chick chased the other chick off, the parent chased the bigger chick...it was chaos but very entertaining and made for some good action shots.