Shooting Deer in Richmond Park

With a camera of course! A few years ago, I used to live just round the corner from Richmond Park but only really got back into wildlife photography when I decamped to the countryside. So now, it's a 4.30am start and a long, dark drive up the M4 if I want to witness the famous deer rutting season.

And like all of Mother Nature's spectaculars, you have to be lucky when you're there. And yesterday wasn't one of those lucky days. Although the dominant stag at Richmond did a lot of bellowing, he wasn't getting much action from the ladies and his competitors were giving him a wide birth yesterday. A couple of youngsters had a short battle in amongst the bracken, but I have a feeling the full antics of rutting season is still a little way off.

The grey, misty morning was brightened by the presence of some of my fellow photographers from the Nature Photographers Forums and I was privileged enough to meet the head of photography for the Natural History Museum. The infamous Richmond Park parakeets also added a splash of colour to the day, with twenty five of them trying to do battle with a resident heron. And now I finally understand why people complain about the parakeets. I had previously thought there were only a handful until I was treated to the cacophony of hundreds of them singing over head. Amazing that all of them came from a single pair released there forty years ago.