Seal the Deel

Below is a picture of one of the more interesting sights I’ve seen recently, it’s a seal wrestling a large (over a meter long) elongated fish, probably a particularly large common eel or a ling, the seal seemed to be having some trouble overpowering the trashing fish and kept surfacing every minute or so to continue its battle. Unfortunately the weather, the seals distance and my camera skills did not add up to give me a pride worthy shot! Still, worth keeping for posterity.

 

 

I also decided to make my weekly visit to the Atlantic pond and Cork Lough which revealed great numbers of young birds. Mallards, coots, moorhens and domestic greylags all have chicks in the water attracting the ooh’s and aah’s of onlookers. The mallard chicks in particular are everywhere at the moment, in fact it’s hard not to step on them (please don’t, it’s not nice).

Saturday was an especially lucky day as I found two grey herons and a little egret all posing perfectly along the bank and seemingly unbothered by my presence and the presence of a cerebrally challenged teenage girl who decided to try chasing them off with an umbrella. The little egret is usually very shy and unapproachable but today showed a change in behaviour by staying put. I named him Monty (the nearby heron is called Python). 

I managed to get some pretty good close-ups of Monty but unfortunately his snow white plumage, the lighting and the rippling murky water all messed up my shots, they turned out greyer then I had hoped and lacking in detail. Still, could be worse! Note the yellow feet, I’m not sure why this evolved; perhaps they appear like water plant stalks to passing fish? 

Note also, the size difference between Monty (back) and Python (front), the grey heron truly is an underrated bird with its massive wingspan and spear like bill!

In other parts of the city I finally managed some half descent shots of a dunnock, not full framed but none the less good for a bird that spends most of its time hiding from me.

It should be noted that it’s a bad idea to approach too closely or photograph a nest, many species are highly sensitive to human contact so it’s best to stay at a respectful distance.  In fact I believe it’s illegal to photograph a bird on a nest.

Robin of the day!