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Morning Dog Walk: The Esteva Is Flowering!?

I take a camera along on my Dog Walks to bring you some of the sightings that I see on my morning walks, these photos are rarely going to be great quality as its hard enough keeping an energetic Dog entertained and get close enough to anything. They also help me identify where species are so that I can plan to return.

I haven’t published any Dog Walk Blogs for a while and this is down to the fact that we now have 3 dogs, yes we have another rescued dog called Snowy (photos of him soon), which makes takin a camera a bit difficult, particulary as 2 of them are still being trained.

Anyway, this morning we stumbled across this line flower on one of the Esteva (Gum Rock Rose) plants. This is very strange as they normally flower in April. This is just a single flower but strange nonetheless. Maybe it’s down to lack of rain throughout the year and the sudden wetness has caused it to flower.


Shot and edited using Lightroom on my Samsung Galaxy S9+Continue reading >>

An Aggressive Mantis

Yesterday morning I was cleaning one of the terraces here at the Quinta and noticed a female Preying Mantis under the lip one of the steps. It was a warm December day and assumed she was laying an egg sack, called an Ootheca. She actually wasn’t so as I needed to hose down the area I decided to move her. I have relocated many Mantises by picking them up and they usually stand their ground but this lady was having none of it. She immediately went I to full defence mode and started to grab my fingers with her Raptorial Legs. As you can see in the photos she even opened her wings to make her look scary but actually I think made her look more pretty!

All photos were shot and edited using Lightroom on my Samsung Galaxy S9+ Smartphone.


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Morning Dog Walk: Sheep Poo Mushrooms!

I take a camera along on my Dog Walks to bring you some of the sightings that I see on my morning walks, these photos are rarely going to be great quality as its hard enough keeping an energetic Dogs entertained and get close enough to anything. They also help me identify where species are so that I can plan to return.

This morning whilst walking along the river bed we noticed some tiny mushrooms/toadstools/fungi (delete as applicable!) growing on closer inspection we noticed that they had sprouted out of sheep poo droppings.

These photos captured on my mobile doesn’t really show the scale, but those droppings are small sheep droppings of about 1cm wide. It just goes to show that a tiny bit of rain kick starts life. I’m not sure what the tiny bug on the right sheep dropping on the 2nd photo is.


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I Also Captured Last Night’s Sunset On My Smartphone – How Does It Compare?

As you have probably already seen, last night was a stunning sunset and I made my way to a location to capture it (Read Blog Post).

As it was a very relaxed shoot, let’s be honest, what is more relaxed than watching a sunset, I decided to see if I could capture the same scene on my Smartphone camera! Everyone knows someone who knows someone who knows a photographer that has shot a wedding on an iPhone (hmm?). I can’t even begin to remember how many times I’ve heard that. If I’m honest, I actually hate all the internet articles stating that the iPhone is as capable as a dSLR. Most of them are simply sponsored articles or what I call clever marketing! It really isn’t as capable and (as far as I’m concerned) it never will be. However, that doesn’t make a Smartphone camera incapable of capturing stunning images. So could I recreate the same image? Read on.

Here is the shot from my Nikon D850 dSLR.

{Click image to view in the shop}
Autumn Sunset In The Algarve Hills
📷 Nikon D850, AF-S 24-70mm f/2.8E @ 48mm, 0.6sec, f/13, ISO64
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The Dampness At Night Has Started The Beeps

Now that autumn is starting, although the days are still warm, even hot, the evenings are starting to cool down and dew is settling. This has started the almost electronic sounding beeps of the autumn mating calls of the Iberian Midwife Toads.

We have one in our vegetable patch tonight, clever toad as its very damp in there and plenty of bugs to eat. It was calling this evening so I found it and took this photo with my smartphone. These toads are small, this one smaller than 4cm in length.

I will try and get some video of it calling over the next few nights, but of course if I approach, it stops.


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Nature Being Nature Is Tough Sometimes

A few days ago we found a very young European Bee-Eater, when I say very young, it was still a nestling. The new feathers still had their “straw” coverings.

This was confusing as European Bee-Eaters nest in deep tunnels and the young shouldn’t be out of the nest.

The bird is now in the care of the guys at RIAS in Olhão (RIAS website) and if all goes well, we can visit to see the release.

However, the confusion has been resolved.

Unfortunately, one of the nests has been dug open. I don’t really know what has done this, possibly a Fox, Marten, Weasel or Polecat.


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