Photographing Gannets For The First Time at Bempton Cliffs

If you are keen to photograph birds during the summer months, you really should head to the coast because it is just brimming with life at this time of year.

Even though the weather was pretty poor over the weekend, I headed over to Yorkshire for my first visit to the RSPB reserve at Bempton Cliffs. While I had enjoyed photographing seabirds on the Farne Islands just a few weeks earlier, I was keen to see and photograph Gannets for the very first time.

The weather may have been very gloomy and very rainy but the birds did not disappoint... up close, the Gannets are just beautiful. A large number of the Gannets can be seen at the far end of the reserve and the bird swooped and soared over the cliffs - putting on quite the display. And when they came into land, many also obliged by posing for pictures.

However, it is not all about Gannets at Bempton Cliffs, as there were still plenty of Razorbills, Guillemots and Kittiwakes on show - some still had young.

If you are keen on catching sight of a puffin this summer, you are running out of time. Many of the puffin residents at Bempton Cliffs have already gone back out to sea - but there were a few dotted around the cliffs.

Guillemots

Guillemots

Puffin

Razorbills

It may not have been the warm and sunny day that all of us visiting Bempton Cliffs would have hoped for, but I left with the images that I was looking for. The site is doing some wonderful conservation work and is a very special place. 

The Wonderful World of Birds

There's nothing that I love more than getting out and about with my camera, experiencing the natural world, and enjoying the fresh air. While I have been out taking photos for a good few years, this is the first time that I have started to write a blog.

I do get out and about all year around, summer gives you such a different experience then spring, autumn and winter as there are animal babies everywhere. Yes, we have reached the time of year when the young of 2016 start to take their first exciting steps into the world.

I love photographing wildlife as a whole but am particularly drawn to birds as I just find them truly fascinating. At this time of year, there are fledglings all over the place and there were plenty at Pennington Flash over the weekend. I was hoping to capture some images of the birds with their young... and I am delighted to say that I was not left disappointed.

But it was a Mute Swan family that grabbed everyone's attention as mum and her young sat basking in the sun on the water's edge. Mum seemed totally unfazed by how close people were getting to her babies and it was great to see them all together.

There's something about swans that are just so majestic and regal - I never get tired of photographing them.

All over the site, there were parents with their young, feeding their babies while some chicks were exploring their surrounding solo and getting used to life outside the safety of the nest.

Pennington Flash is a site that I have been visiting for a few years and you always leave having captured something. Wildfowl and woodland birds and there in their droves and there is nothing better than spending a few hours by the lakes and the canal.