It is going to be hard to express myself in the blog today, a mixture of excitement, elation and disappointment. I had decided to go to the hide earlier this morning because I know enough about Kingfishers, at least the Alphin Brook birds, to learn that they are very actively feeding just after dawn.  This is the best time to see  and photograph them.  However, dawn presents real problems  of light.  There just isn't enough to be able to capture the action.  So it proved this morning.  I was thrilled when bang on 8 o'clock, there she was and she was straight away interested in the tank, she knows now that it contains fish….. and she wanted one! I took dozens and dozens of photos of her looking in to the tank and eventually she took the plunge, but it was so dull I just couldn't freeze the underwater action.  The photos I have taken today are perhaps the very best that I have been able to get but still not the ones I am after. Yes, I will keep on and on until it all comes together. I may try and find out more about fast flash because that would solve the problem.  In the meantime, especially for my friends who are following the events as they unfold, here's a few photos which are interesting to say the least. 

The first one shows her after she has been in and out and she is dealing with her free offering, perched on the edge of the tank.

Here's another which she caught and took to the nearby log to beat the living daylights out of it. It's a cracking shot I think.

For those who may harbour some concerns about the ethics of this, and I do to a degree, take some comfort from the fact that she is being offered food on a plate as it were, in much the same way, in fact, exactly the same way as feeding a Robin from a bird table… except of course the fish are alive! What would be wrong would be to distract her from actually feeding but she is getting food so I am content. 

Normal portraits of Kingfishers always look nice and I have taken more than 1000 of these so I always try to find something with a bit of character and this next one does just that. 

She is actually peering in to the tank at the tasty morsels inside. I will allow myself an "awesome" at this point!

Again, something just a bit different as she looks towards me, head on!

This next one captures the essence of Autumn, lovely golden colours that compliment the Kingfishers plumage in a wonderful way.  As she was posing I knew that these few were going to be nice.