TomKal foto

Bustards are the species I absolutely have a weakness for, so my news from Australia I start with them. Knowing that I would spend some time in Australia, I had arranged a trip that was supposed to show me this noncommercial, wild and natural Australia. It would be hardly possible and probably dangerous to realize such a trip on my own, but it turn out to be feasible thanks to Hans, who perfectly organized our photography workshops . I mean perfectly. Because in a few days he showed me over 100 species of animals (mostly birds). A hundred of species in a few days, even in Australia it is a great achievement. Yes, it's not a mistake. There will be more than 100 species of Australian birds on my website. Of course some of them will not reach a full- size gallery according to the standards of my site (24 photos), some of them will have only documentary value, but some of them will make us come back again and again, and will have a full-size gallery or even its multiplicity, and of a quality definitely not just documentary. In my descriptions that accompany each species of animal I would also like to show how specific and different is photographing nature in Australia. It would require some reorganization of the images presented so far and changing the galleries convention to form a complete story. But the website will not be rearranged for this purpose, to each description (INFORMATIONS) of Australian species at the end the number of species will be added according to the order of gallery formation. Thus, reading the descriptions in increasing order we will have a complete story about animals , photo workshop, peculiarities I had the opportunity to observe. To put it in a nutshell, about Australia that I saw, and what is more important, that I took pictures of. That’s it by way of introduction to a whole range of new images which will appear in the near future. How distant the future will be? It's hard to say because there are thousands of pictures  to browse, a lot of sounds of birds I was able to record, it will also take time to treat them, then - descriptions and their translating. So probably it will be weeks before all shot species appear verified, in the right order.

Finally  again I express my thanks to Hans for his commitment, knowledge of birds, of the bush, a sense of humor. Spending time in the bush without his company would have been less exciting and my experiences  would have been much, much more modest, and Australian observations and impressions would have been limited to, let's call it the urban experience.

And now let’s move on to my Australian bustards . This is the third species of this bird photographed by myself. Having my Spanish experience I was not sure that it would be possible to take photos of bustards, especially when  the planned convention of photographic workshops in Australia was extremely different. But that will be the subject of another  story. Bustards, perhaps in a gesture of gratitude for my admiration I have for this species, allowed me to take their pictures and it was pretty easy. Well, maybe not quite easy, because to see them in their natural environment first of all you have to spend a day on a plane to get to Tonswille and then a few hours in a car driving  to the bush. There was no one day without taking photos of bustards . As we succeeded in  finding  some bustard I followed him slowly  taking photos in the same time. Once the contact  ended with two pictures only, then the bustard immediately flew away. Australian bustards like those observed in Europe  were full of peace, equanimity, some dignity in behavior. In Spain you could see clusters of a few or dozen females or males. In Australia I always dealt with one bird, once I had an opportunity to find four specimens in one place. Maybe it was because of the season? In Spain it was the mating season (spring), in Australia  summer in its peak (February). When taking photos of bustards it is quick and easy to sense the moment  when the distance between the bustard and photographer becomes too small and the bird flies off. If I did not crossed the limit of safe distance the bustard determined  and I followed him quietly it even started to ignore me and got used to my presence. Australian bustards are not as colorful as their European relatives and are of a bit smaller size. Their weight is up to 13 kg, with a wingspan of about 2 meters. Thus they are smaller than "our" European bustards. Probably this is why they can much more quickly rise into the air. In Spain there was no possibility to follow  bustards, but here "walking" through the bush when following the bustard you have to be careful, as we came across snakes and a two-meter long monitor lizard, not to mention venomous insects, I had read about while preparing to my trip. All this makes it necessary to take precautions during the photo session, but how can you not get carried away by the view of so majestically strolling bird in front of the lens. There was no way to record the voice. Bustards were feeding quietly, every now and again bending forward to something without giving out any sound. On the last day of our workshop due to the time of my departure we had only a few hours starting from sunrise. In the vicinity of Tonsville there are a few well-organized places to observe and take photos of birds. But we both me and Hans were surprised when a bustard appeared right on the road, the way we were driving  on. I walked out of the car cautiously and took ​​a few photos. The bustard was only observing me, besides totally engaged in posing to my photos. When I came back to the car Hans told me that he had been watching birds for years and in his opinion bustards were not the species so easy to photograph, and there, we were lucky to see them every day. It is interesting that in the park neighborhood there was an airport. The bustard did not care about jet aircrafts flying every now and then. Maybe former assumptions that their assimilation in our urbanized world would be impossible in fact were rather hasty? In any case, welcome to the new bustard’s gallery, this time of the Australian bustard, the gallery of considerable size and quality.