Best Birdwatching Binocular 2010

At this time of the year many industries, especially in entertainment and sports like to look back over the year and go over some of the highlights as well as the best in a particular category - The BBC Sports Personality of the Year springs to mind.

So I thought why not do something similar within the field of binoculars and highlight some of the best binoculars in a range of the most common uses, including Best Birdwatching Binocular. Nothing new here as it turns out that with a little research Binoculars.com, on of the best on-line retailers of optics already has one.

Why I bring it up is in their choice of the best bird binoculars for 2010:

Pentax 8x43 DCF SP Binoculars
Now don't get me wrong, I think that these are a cracking pair of binoculars and they have a bunch of excellent features including aspherical eyepiece lenses, high-resolution phase-coated roof prisms, scratch-resistant hydrophobic coating on exposed objective and eyepiece lenses and multi-coated optical elements.

Where the lack a little is in one of the most important areas of any really great birding binocular and that is in their field of view. These Pentax binoculars have a field of view of 330ft at 1000 yards (110m at 1000m) or an angle of view of 6.3°, which to be honest in my view is only just above average - really great 8x42 wide angle binoculars like the Swift Audubon binoculars (see below) can have a field of view as wide as 430ft @1000 yards (8.15°)

The winner of the Best Binocular Reviews Best Birding Binocular 2010 was indeed the porro prism version of the Swift 8.5x44 Audubon ED Binoculars that does have a massively wide field of view as well as a host of other great features including BaK-4 Prisms, fully multi-coated optics and extra low dispersion glass (ED) that all add up to produce a very high quality and bright image.

For more take a look at the Best Binocular Reviews Annual Binocular Awards 2010.

Side Note:
For those who are interested the short-list for the BBC Sports Personality of the Year 2010 is below:

• Mark Cavendish
• Tom Daley
• Jessica Ennis
• David Haye
• AP McCoy
• Graeme McDowell
• Graeme Swann
• Phil Taylor
• Lee Westwood
• Amy Williams

The View from my Office

When I first came to the UK and used to work in London, I had an in-house joke with some friends where we would email each other photos of the 'views from our office', just to prove how dull our jobs were!

Now, I am lucky enough to be able to work from home and whilst it does have many benefits, there are also many distractions, especially if you are like me and enjoy wildlife photography.

On a few of the sunny days this spring and summer, I have often taken my laptop along with my camera, to do a little work outside.

I have seen plenty of birds, including the usual common UK birds and have also managed to spot two of the three woodpeckers that you get in the UK, the Green woodpecker and the lesser spotted woodpecker.

As well as the birds, I have seen plenty of butterflies, a Grass Snake (Natrix natrix) who lives in my compost heap, the occasional sighting of a pair of Monkjack Deer and a young fox who has taken to stealing my shoes and planting them in my vegetable garden!

Whilst I still miss all the wildlife from back home, I am really enjoying the wonderful nature that has taken to visiting my urban garden here in the UK this summer.

African Jacana (Actophilornis africanus)

I took this photo on Lake Kariba in Zimbabwe in June 2008 of the African Jacana (Actophilornis africanus) as it waded at the waters edge as it searched for food which consisted of mostly insects, but will also eat fish, crabs, shrimp and other aquatic animals like frogs.

I thought I would write a post about it not because this photo is anything special, but for me the African Jacana (Actophilornis africanus) is a pretty interesting bird:

It is only the male who incubates and raises the chicks, the female has nothing to do with it after mating, infact she polyandrous and can mate with up to four males in a season!

The job to build the nest is also left to the male, which he makes from leaves and other plant material and uses floating vegetation as the foundations! (The success rate of raising a chick to adulthood is pretty low!) The female will then lay about four speckled glossy brown eggs.