I recently bought a gimbal head for my tripod, just a cheap one to test out the tech thinking that if I get on with it I can save up for a decent one in the future.
I really wanted to get it to try and increase my chances of getting decent shots of birds in flight. Up to now I have had to use my big lens handheld for this and the results have been hit n miss so I was hoping this new head would be easy to use and make a difference.
I hoped there would be a fair selection of waders and other birds along the shore but unfortunately the tide was almost all the way out so the large flocks of birds were way out of range as they followed the tide feeding in the freshly uncovered silt. I could see some common gulls and some black-headed gulls so figured I would practice on them, I wasn't too bothered as I was really just there to test my new kit.
As I got to the bottom of the steps onto the beach I was greeted by a guy who was equipped with a bird watching scope. He started to tell me about a bird that was flying along the shore, I guess he assumed I was a fellow twitcher and was going to spot a celebrity visitor, he explained that it was a gull-billed tern and he suggested a good spot to look for it.
I wondered why the guy was so excited about seeing it, but it appears that these birds normally breed in Southern Europe, Eastern Asia and the coast of North America and they winter further south in Africa, the Caribbean, northern South America , Southern Asia and New Zealand. Here along the Dee Estuary in the North West of England I guess it is quite a long way out of it's normal territory so I felt privileged to see it.
As you can see I managed to get a few good shots too, he was quite a way away but I think they turned out OK and the gimbal head seems to be doing its job. I will try and get some more practice with it and look forward to sharing more pictures here...
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