A quick visit at Lake Aspen

I went to Lake Aspen on Sunday to see if I could take any photos of the Velvet Scoter that has migrated there this winter. The weather was for once much better as you can see by the image I took with my mobile phone of Lake Aspen. This is the first time in many weeks that I actually have some sunshine during a day off.

Lake Aspen lies between Lerum and Jonsered and Säveån flows thru both towns on its way towards the sea. I want to see more of Säveån as I now there is many more interesting places to see than my usual ones. I am particularly interested in the ones from Lake Aspen towards Alingsås further into the country.

I had a good knowledge about where the Velvet Scoter would be and I discovered it easily once there. Sadly it lay smack in the middle of Lake Aspen. That meant I hadn´t a chance to take any good photo of the bird. Maybe if I had a 1200mm but that isn´t the case.

Instead I went back to the White-throated Dipper place in Jonsered to see if the sun shone down on Säveån there. That wasn´t the case and I suspect it will stay like this until the sun is higher up in the sky or maybe early in the morning.

The water level was much higher today as the flood gates from Lake Aspen had been raised slightly. That meant I couldn´t access the same place as yesterday as it now was under water. I also noticed fewer birds but found the one that I was looking for, the one that was actively searching for food the day before.

I sat myself just at the water’s edge and watched how the bird. I took some photos and this one is pretty good with nice sharpness and soft colors.

This photo isn´t sharp but show you one of the ways the bird goes into the water while hunting. It sits on the other side of the water and flies out into the stream and goes into the water belly first. Then it dives under and often gets out of the water 3-4 meters further down. It’s a nice spectacle to look at. The other way this bird is doing is sit on a branch, like in the other picture, and then dive head first into the water.

This is the behavior that I like to document but then I need much better light to be able to raise the shutter speed. I can of course raise the ISO slightly but then the noise will be too much for my taste. I think I now will wait until the start of February before I go back but that is if the weather conditions stay this mild. If winter comes with full force and the snow gets down onto the sides of Säveån then maybe I’l be back to test my luck.