Having acquired a new (old and decidedly second hand really) kayak recently and kitted it out a bit for photography I managed to get out a few time on a lake (‘flash’) on our local canal.  I’ve spent some ‘quality time’ drifting about quietly near a family of Great Crested Grebes (a parent and two chicks).  The parent is still feeding the youngsters but I’ve seen them also catch fish so they must be getting close to self sufficient.  From my experience ‘GCGs’ tend to be reasonably wary but if you sight still without making noise and only creep up very slowly in a boat, you can get close enough, occasionally, for some photos.  

I’ve added a few of the images to the Great Crested Grebe gallery including the two below of the parent having a shake after a dive and catching a crayfish which one of the youngsters eventually got to eat.

The crayfish caught by the grebe is an american signal crayfish.  This is an incredibly invasive species as it attacks and eats many of our local fish and water fauna and damages the canal banks by burrowing into it.  I’d not seen grebes predating these fierce animals.  It’s good to see them taking some but I suspect the impact is minimal.   

I’ve also added (yet another) heron pic.  You can see that one in the Heron gallery too.