The wing-blur shows just how quick these beats are because the settings for the camera were 1/4000 second.

I would have been disappointed if, after numerous opportunities I didn't manage to get at least one or two photographs of Whinchat in flight. So today, in between the Cuckoo visits I tried ery hard  to photograph them flying from the various perches in front of me. It's not as easy as you would imagine, small birds fly at an incredibly fast pace and with natural light you have to get the very best out of the camera equipment. I do enjoy seeing and taking photographs of birds in flight though, suddenly you see aspects of a bird that becuase of the speed, you hadn't been aware of with just the naked eye. In the wide open spaces of Dartmoor, even when the sun isn't shining, you can achieve some high shutter speeds for example, above at 1/4000 but even that wasn't quick enough to freeze the wing beats. This is why capturing the moment the bird flies  is hit and miss and its hard to get the subject in the frame. The more I look at thepicture above though, the 

I'm thrilled with this one, I particularly like the pattern on the leading edge of the wings which we wouldn't normally be able to see.

Female Whinchat

An unusual angle of the female with prey.

The Whinchat male.