Argaty Red Kites

A few weeks ago saw me in Doune, by Stirling, where I joined Gloria for a spectacular day at the Red Kite observation hides on Lerrocks Farm at Argaty. The weather was perfect (I'm so tempted to say 'glorious' but I'll resist it as long as I can!), and the Kites were displaying on top form (glorious display?... no, resist the temptation!).



Gloria was with me to learn how to use shutter speed, aperture and ISO together to get good exposures of the birds as they swooped and dived between bright blue sky, bright white clouds and down into the darker vegetation below.



It's a tough assignment for a beginner, but Gloria had already had a whole day of tuition with me previously, plus the booklet I'd written specifically for her to help explain exposures and composition and how to use her own particular camera. So, armed with the basic theories and a bit of previous practice, it was a slightly nervous but brave lady that stepped into the hide with me that morning!

We arrived early so had plenty of time to run through and practise the techniques of changing exposure settings manually, and following a fast-moving subject.



A hot chocolate and biscuit break later and we were ready for the main event. The hide had filled up by now with other eager Kite followers, so we squeezed in together and waited for the Red Kites to arrive.

We were all treated to a very interesting and knowledgeable talk from one of the staff members at the farm before the birds were lured in by the promise of food. Did you know that Red Kites only weigh about 2 lbs? They have a huge wingspan though of nearly 6ft, and that's why they can stay in the air so long without needing to flap about very much!

Another interesting fact we found out was that Red Kites in the UK were almost hunted into oblivion, mainly by landowners who mistakenly believed that the birds would carry off their livestock! How something that weighs as little as bag of sugar would have the strength to carry off a lamb is a bit beyond me, but apparently that's what they thought, and so believed they were totally within rights to bring the Red Kites to the brink of extinction.

The Red Kites we saw were extremely agile and superb opportunists, picking up the food and eating it on the wing.



They will take rodents and small birds, but anything larger is beyond them and they rely on carrion; coming in after the crows have torn open the carcass for them to get in.

The Vermin Acts of the 16th Century listed the Red Kite as vermin, requiring it to be killed without exception. Only a tiny colony in mid-Wales remained, as the Red Kite became extinct in Scotland and England. Thankfully there is now a lot more knowledge about these beautiful birds and the re-introduction programmes are a huge success right across the UK. So close to total annihilation were the UK's population that researchers at Nottingham University discovered the entire population of kites in 1977 were derived from just one female! That really is quite astonishing!! The chap at the farm explained that chicks are now being introduced from other parts of Europe to help re-establish the population and also to obviously help widen the gene pool.

So, no longer seen as vermin, the Red Kites can now be viewed in so many parts of the UK. If you get a chance to visit the Argaty Red Kites, (http://www.argatyredkites.co.uk/) or any other Red Kite feeding station, it is a fantastic... glorious.... experience! If you would like to learn wildlife photography from a leading expert, then Argaty's resident photographer Dean Bricknell gives lessons at the farm. Recently voted 'favourite nature photographer' in the Scottish Nature Photography Awards, you're in great hands!

If you are interested in a 3 day one-to-one tuition with me, then I will be delighted to guide you through all the steps you need to get your camera off the automatic settings and start taking photographs that you can proudly hang on your wall. At just £185 for 3 days (may be consecutive or spread over time to suit you) and 2 instruction manuals written by me specifically for you, it's a great gift for anyone... or even to just treat yourself.

Rebecca, x

Winter in the Lakes.

The English Lake District in winter has to be one of the loveliest places to take your camera for a walk!



You have to be prepared for all weathers for sure, and a steady supply of hotel shower caps is particularly useful... not for me, I hasten to add, but for the camera!! With snow on the hills, ice on the lakes, low evening sun, mist, raging waterfalls and only a handful of other tourists, winter is a very good time to be there! Of course it did rain, and snow, and rain and snow again, but it's all good for keeping the lakes topped up and for bringing some drama into the skies.



Brought some drama into travelling round as well, but how dull things would be if they were always easy!

Of all the places I visited while there, the road from Keswick round via Buttermere and back to Keswick is the one I most want to go back and explore again. Oh, and more of Ullswater, and more of Ennerdale, and more of the Langdales, and the fort at Hardknott...



and Eskdale, and Wast Water, and... well, you get the picture!

I don't know about Hardknott, but those sheep up there are right hard nuts!!



Did you know that the Herdwick sheep will eat their own wool in the winter? They are real hardcase lil lambs!! Snow? Pah, they laugh in the face of snow! Winter? Bring it on!!

One of the unexpected, and maybe even slightly guilty pleasures of the Lakes (though I'm certainly not embarrassed to say I love trains!!) is found at the Ravenglass and Eskdale Railway.



A narrow gauge railway trundles you along through the countryside between the high mountains of Eskdale and the coast at Ravenglass...



...or the other way about, whichever your preference! It is such a great wee thing, so well managed and lovingly maintained, it is truly delightful. I will certainly return to the Lake District as soon as there's a chance. I love it, whatever the weather!

Rebecca, x

www.rtphotographics.co.uk
rebecca@rtphotographics.co.uk

Sian Rocks!

We had such a laugh with Sian and her mum Sandee a couple of weeks ago.

Sian is so full of fun and at just 10 years old (though nearly 11 now!) she didn't need any encouragement to be playing around with the drum kit or the electric guitars! None of us know how to play, (and I guess if you know anything at all about instruments, then you'll see in the photos that we clearly don't know how to play!), but it was all just for a laugh anyway.

Sian has the most amazing collection of clothes and we wanted to show off her style as well as her spirit. We started off with her jumping onto the beanbag to get things warmed up and to get her laughing, then it was a quick change and onto the drum kit.

A couple of electric guitars and a cloth cat later, we moved into fashion and set up as if backstage at a Galliano show... not that any of us have been backstage, front stage or anywhere near a stage at a Galliano show but hey, we were enjoying ourselves in our own fanciful way!

We rounded the shoot off with a William Morris print tapestry, Sandee joined Sian for a few shots, and then it was into the much-needed coffee and choccy cake!!

Thanks to Sian, Sandee and Niaesha for another great day.

Sian rocks!! :-D x

Rebecca, x

http://www.rtphotographics.co.uk/

Back Again!

Well, it's been a pretty unpleasant few months on a personal level, and I certainly won't bore you with all the details but suffice it to say I'm back on my feet and looking forward to moving ahead, picking up the camera and getting back into the studio! Never mind about counsellors and treatments and all that nonsense, there's no therapy quite so complete as a good dose of photography!!

It's not just the joy of looking at a photograph, or a landscape or a bonny face, but it's the whole thing. It's the thrill of the chase... wanting an image that you have in your head and working out how to make it happen, then actually making it happen!

I know that I have so much to learn still in this business, but I can honestly say that I truly don't think I will ever be bored. It fascinates me on so many levels. It satisfies the scientist in me, the artist in me, and, I'm actually proud to say... the geek in me! What else can give you a combination of educational and technical challenges alongside a perfect excuse to go birdwatching, being out in the fresh air ambling about the countryside... and combine that with a passion for people and a desire to help them feel good about themselves? I suppose there are plenty of things that can do all of that, but for me, photography is the therapy I need.

It's always held a fascintion for me, from the days when dad had his dark room in the cupboard upstairs, bewildering and astounding me as pictures emerged dripping from those baths of strange solutions. I remember when we got our first camera and took it outside to capture the fun of playing in the street. It was around the same time as we had our first pair of rollerskates... there's a picture of one of us (may be me, may be my twin sister) skating down the road with arms outstretched in a wild and rather out-of-control manner! It's also obviously one of our earlier attempts at photography (again, maybe by me, maybe by my sister or perhaps our brother);the skates look great but anything from the neck up is completely out of shot. Hey ho.

The technical side of taking a photograph fascinates me too. I always wondered about f-stops and focal lengths and shutter speeds, it was a total mystery to me... but what's a mystery apart from a riddle that has to be solved? I didn't grow up watching 'Scooby Doo' to not be excited by a mystery (or a big pile of sandwiches!!!). These questions are now answered and I have a reasonable grasp on the subject, but it still excites me and I still get fascinated by the different effects you can achieve by fiddling about with manual exposures. I'll never know enough about it and I really don't think I'll ever get tired or bored of learning and pushing forwards with it. Of course I probably won't have many friends left, but those who really know me don't seem to mind too much that I'm a complete and utter nerd.

No longer embarrassed by my penchant for cheese and pickle sandwiches, or birdwatching, or my glasses that sit sideways across my face 'cos I sat on them... all this is a part of who I am, and I'm happy with that. So, after a wee break to sort out some things away from photography, I'm back again and back in therapy... photographic therapy! Ah, that's better :))

So, do you want to see just how geeky I am? Here's a pic I took on my mobile phone while out with the dog...

The long shadows caught my eye and I played about for ages trying to make my own shadow look like a tree or a giant or whatever other shapes I could throw!!! Oh dear, how old am I? Made me chuckle anyway. The dog thought I was clearly bonkers and left me to it but I was having fun. Just using the mobile phone, but a camera is a camera and I've been having a huge amount of fun with the phone just recently! More on that later...

Rebecca, x

www.rtphotographics.co.uk

From Dawn to Ducks!

Last weekend was, of course, the weekend of love... and I loved my weekend!!



Saturday was superb. Started out nice and early as I had to take John to work; perfect timing to get up onto Moulin Moor for sunrise again. I had tried the weekend before, but the weather was miserable... dull, grey, snowy, just plain 'dreich' as they call it round here! Saturday promised to be a wee bitty better so I tried again and was rewarded with a mild, pastel-hued and dappled dawn sky above the moor. Maybe not spectacular, but prettily pink nonetheless (sorry Walter, I know you hate pink but pink it was and I had no control over that!).

I pottered about the old cottage again and started wondering about poor old Mr Soutar. I say 'old Mr Soutar' but I have no idea how old he actually was when he died. I think I mentioned last week that he lived in the cottage and died back in 1800 and something, well I found the memorial stone and wrote the inscription down for you this week because I think it's important. It's tragic and sad but also quite heartwarming at the same time. I also think it's important when I spend so much time pottering about his place that I try and find out a bit more about the man.

I want to know who Mr Soutar was and wonder if he minds me being there now. I hope he doesn't. I love the old place and feel really at home there, even though it is falling apart and ruined. Hmm, analyse that!! Anyway, what I find heartwarming about Mr Soutar's story is the last line of the inscription...

"In memory of John Soutar

who perished here in a snowstorm 3rd March 1897

Erected by a few friends"

I like that simple but telling 'Erected by a few friends'. The temperature was -4 but I never felt cold. I felt cosy and at home... ok, a few layers of tech mountain gear certainly helps, but I felt peaceful and warm on the inside. I sat by the ruins of Mr Soutar's cottage and wondered who he loved and how he lived.

I sat for quite a while watching the clouds, wondering about a stranger's life, took photos from where I sat but never, at any point, noticed the heart-shaped stone on the wall beside me!!



As soon as I started editing the files there it was, as clear as anything! How on earth did I miss it in real life? On Love Weekend of all weekends!!!

Anyway, totally unaware of the nearby heart of stone, my heart was light as I set off up the hill behind the cottage. It doesn't look much from there, but by 'eck, my heart was ready to explode by the time I got to the top, I'm so unfit! It's one of those hills that has false peaks... just when you think you're getting to the top, yikes, there's even more to climb!

It is worth the climb though, the view is beautiful. Not the craggy in-your-face high peaks you get in the West, but just as beautiful in their own understated way.



I had the famous grouse for company... The 'Famous Grouse' is only a few miles and wing flaps away (by Crieff), so I do like to believe that he was strutting his stuff in the snow just ahead of me :-)



A couple flew off as I neared the top so maybe he was entertaining a lady grouse friend on this lover's weekend. Oops, never was very subtle... how rude of me, barging in on his cosy tryst!! Sorry fella!

Having got to the top it only then dawned on me that a bowl of 'Red Berries Special K' just isn't man enough for this job. A bacon roll was calling, but that was back in Blair and I was 1089 foot up the top of a hill. Time for my lardy waterproofed arse to come into action.

Wooooo, that's the way to get down!!!

Oh my word, how much fun was that? Sliding down near-vertical slopes on my backside at speeds far too fast to be sensible! Sensible? Who needs sensible? I may be rapidly approaching 43, I may be Great Aunt Becca, but who said I have to be sensible? I laughed out loud all the way down, totally alone, not a soul for miles around... apart from Mr Grouse and his bird of course ;-) and it was so funny. I tried taking a photo but it didn't really work. Added some effects in PS to try and give an impression but hey ho, you'll just have to use your imagination there.



When I got to the bottom it occurred to me that I could have video'd the slide on my phone and it would have been pretty funny, but the bacon roll was more appealing than the thought of climbing back up the hill just so I could film the trip down!! Maybe another time if the snow is still there ;-)

So, bacon roll mission accomplished, it was on to the next stop, Restenneth Priory at Forfar.



An ancient site dating back to the Picts, Restenneth Priory as it stands (in ruins) today really formed from around 1100AD. Obviously there have been extensive builds and re-builds along the way, but there is still very much an ancient feel to the place.

I went with Niaesha, my friend and assistant,



and we were amazed at the transformation to the stones when the sun broke through the clouds. The late afternoon sun painted the stone in a gorgeous warm golden light, and cast a beautiful shadow from the large tree at the perimeter wall onto the face of the tower. A door in the perimeter wall laid a path of light up to the main chapel, totally transforming the scene and rather taking our breath away!

As the sun sank lower towards the horizon, we decided that Restenneth was done and Forfar Loch would be a lovely end to a fantastic day. The sunset was fairly muted, and the loch isn't the most picturesque in Scotland, but it was a most pleasant end to what had been an extremely pleasant day.



From dawn to ducks, a day well spent indeed :-D

Rebecca,x

http://www.rtphotographics.co.uk/
e-mail rebecca@rtphotographics.co.uk

A Wild Weekend!

Well, a fairly soggy Sunday actually but 'A Wild Weekend' makes for a more exciting headline, I think! Saturday was anything but wild. Just a day indoors sorting out washing and websites, that sort of thing. Sunday was play day though :-)

It started before dawn as I had to take John into work in Pitlochry. He started at 8am, sunrise was roughly 8.10-ish, so time to nip up onto Moulin Moor for some photos at poor old Mr Soutar's place.



Poor old Mr Soutar used to live in the cottage but died one snowy night back in the 1800's as he struggled to get to his door through a bitter and savage storm.



I hope he looks favourably on me being there now, because I love this place and somewhere in my heart feels at home here too. Well, the sun never showed his face but I stayed anyway and had a play with the morning clouds instead. Until it started snowing.



I left a bleak and desolate moor but I shall return again soon, probably with a torch and strong nerves to do some light painting and star trails or something similar. Next on the itinerary was a trip to the Auchingarrich Wildlife Centre in Comrie to meet my friends for a stroll and a roll.



The rolls weren't quite what we were expecting however! Firstly, the cafe was shut for refurbishment so, not to be too disheartened, we agreed to take the pooch for a walk round the hill first and see what we could see before bundling back into the car to head down to Comrie in search of refreshment. We would then come back to Auchingarrich to do the rest of the stroll.

Unfortunately my friend took the promise of 'rolls' a little too literally and promptly took two down the slippery and muddy slope of the big hill. Thankfully no bones were broken, though he did suffer quite a jolt, and thankfully his new camera and new 500mm lens also survived. A lens hood was broken, but as that was the worst of it, it wasn't too bad all things considered!

So, we arrived back to the car a little battered and bruised and very muddy, but the thought of a coffee shop in Comrie lifted our spirits. With good reason. I don't know what the coffee shop was called but it is in the main street and was the only one open so if you happen to be there on a Sunday, go on in. It's lovely!!



Refreshed and somewhat drier and cleaner, we made our way back to Auchingarrich for round 2 of our stroll. We didn't even make it into the car park before we made our first stop to try and photograph the Red Kites that were wheeling above the trees and the Herons that were poaching from the Stork's pond at the park entrance. We'd been there for quite some time when all of a sudden my pal let out a huge chuckle as he had spotted an albino wallaby that was watching us from the wooded hill behind. The expression on the wallaby's face was priceless! He was rooted to the spot for ages just watching us, seemingly wondering what on earth we were doing and maybe even why we hadn't bought him a roll back from the shop ;-)

Next we headed on down to the car park again and set off on the trail around the rest of the Wildlife Centre. Meerkats, Wild Cats, Polecats, and, erm... well, lots of other animals and birds too.



My favourite shot of the day?.. yes, the one that got away!! A group of visitors were walking over the crest of the small hill and were in a fairly tight line all looking down the hill. Towards the bottom of the hill, a tight line of geese all looking up at the visitors. It was a face-off and it was so comical, it had to be taken. Eye to the viewfinder, quickly compose the shot for maximum comedy interpretation and artistic merit, press the shutter button... nothing!!! Full card, aarghhh!!!! Quickly delete something off the card, camera back up to the eye... geese now all out of the shot. Hey ho. Wild weekend? Wild? I was absolutely livid, ha ha.

Note to self, when card is nearly full, change it, don't wait to fill it all the way up only to stop at the shot of the day!! Actually, I couldn't change it as my other card is now kaput and I haven't replaced it yet... another note to self, get some new cards!!!

So that was my weekend. Not exactly wild in a massive adventure kind of way, but wild enough in its own mild way ;-) So, thanks to my very good friends for a lovely day out and a ruffle on the head to my dog for being incredibly well-behaved on the walk round the Wildlife Centre. He's not often on the lead and doesn't like it overly much, but he coped admirably with all the sights and scents and all the little birds and animals around him. He never barked once, never tried to chase anything, and behaved impeccably. Anything for another jelly bean, lol.

Rebecca,x

http://www.rtphotographics.co.uk/
E-mail rebecca@rtphotographics.co.uk

Water Nightmare!

It seems at the moment that wherever you are in the world, water is at the centre of many conversations. Whether it is too much water or not enough, it dominates our lives in so many ways.

Why the watery blog post this week? Well, not only is it the theme for the competition on PPI this month (http://prophotoinsights.net/forum/index.php), but I've also been having a lot of nightmares lately and they all relate to falling into deep, dark, fast flowing water. I have no idea about dream interpretation, whether it's just all oddball notions or there's truth in it, but I do know that I have a waking fear of falling into water.

It'd probably help if I could swim properly but I'm one of those that swims with my head as far out of the water as my stretched neck will let it go. All splash, and thrashing limbs but very little forward propulsion.



I've tried to overcome my fears and put my head under water but so far with no success.

Anyway, that's all by-the-by really, the fact is that my life seems to be getting taken over by watery thoughts, fears, conversations, news items, whatever!

I think the nightmares are brought on by repeated showings of the dreadful Asian tsunami, but also memories of what happened to poor PC Barker, who lost his life in November when the bridge collapsed at Cockermouth.

Then there are the dreadful floods at Macchu Picchu, a remarkable place that has been on my bucket list now for many years; there have also been documentaries about bridge supports being undermined and washed away; news reports about the state of the Forth Road Bridge and how rusty cables can be heard snapping inside the structure; the Tay Rail Bridge disaster of, admittedly, well over a hundred years ago! Every time I look at the modern Tay Rail Bridge, I see the supports from the old bridge sitting alongside it as a kind of memorial to the lives that were lost.

Thinking about all these bridge collapses made me think about how I fell through a wooden bridge as a child. My whole family had walked across it just ahead of me with no problem at all. Along I trot quite merrily and then, crash, straight through and up to my armpits in splintered wood, with my legs kicking in the stream below.

I've also recently been talking to an ex-submariner, who described how they were trained inside some kind of enormous submerged tank thing. Of course that brought back memories of the dreadful Kursk disaster and, however it actually happened, the loss of all those men on the submarine.

So, all in all, it's no great surprise that I've been having a few watery nightmares lately!!

But that has got me thinking again about other people's real life nightmares. Not just from floods, tsunamis and bridge collapses, but from the opposite end of the problem.



Famine and huge-scale disaster as a result of lack of water; the enormous problems and fatalities as a result of lack of clean water and sanitation. How we complain that it's raining again when people across the tropics are suffering drought, famine, and disease as a result of not having enough.

Those who know me well enough know that I am deeply passionate about improving health care and sanitation to poor rural areas of developing countries. I support Water Aid (http://www.wateraid.org/uk/) and I have also joined the online queue for the toilet!! http://www.worldtoiletqueue.org/eng/queuers/join.

I am passionate about water. We need water to survive as much as we need air to breathe. It doesn't always feel like it sitting here in the soggy northern hemisphere, but water is increasingly becoming scarcer and, as a result, even more valuable. Where wars are currently fought over oil fields, we may well soon be seeing wars fought over water supplies. I hope not.

I hope that we can actually come together as a united group of human beings who share a planet to come to some sensible, achievable and workable plans about how all of our futures can be protected. I'm clearly not amongst the world leaders, but if I could, I would ask that they think very hard about what we can all do with water.

In our own small way, even when it is raining so hard that it's coming in sideways, we can help. We all know about not leaving the tap running when we brush our teeth, and about collecting rainwater for the summer garden and so on, but do we all do it all of the time? I don't, I'll admit that, but I am going to try and do more every day. Hopefully one day it'll be habitual and I won't think of it all.



I also hope that writing this blog has helped stop my watery nightmares!!

Rebecca,x
rebecca@rtphotographics.co.uk
http://www.rtphotographics.co.uk/