Kingfishers are notoriously difficult to photograph, appearing only as a flash of blue as they dart from place to place. But patience paid off for one photographer, who captured these stunning images of a kingsfisher at Lackford Lakes, near Bury St Edmunds.
Frances Crickmore, of Flixton Road, Bungay, visited the Suffolk Wildlife Trust site three times without seeing a single kingfisher but her fourth visit paid off and she was treated to a close up view of one of the birds.
The grandmother said: 'I have been waiting quite a long time to see a kingfisher. They are quite hard to find.
'I see them in the river here but they are generally on the move so much. I hardly ever find them sitting in a tree. I heard a lot about people going to Lackford Lakes to see them.
'This was my fourth visit. It takes me an hour to get there but I thought I would try just one more time and just see. The kingfisher was there all morning, sitting on a branch just outside the hide catching fish.
'It was absolutely fantastic. It was a lovely moment when I actually saw the kingfisher sitting so close, just 25ft away.'
Mrs Crickmore is self taught and took up photography about a year ago. She has honed her skills on Fen Farm, where she lives with her husband Graham and one of their three sons.
She also credited her nephew Harry Read for giving her tips and advice every time she bought a new camera.
Mrs Crickmore captured these images of the kingfisher with a Canon 6D with a 400mm telephoto lens.
And it is not the first time her work has appeared in the EDP. A set of images taken by Mrs Crickmore of hares boxing on the family's land were the subject of a double page spread recently.
• To see more photos of our wonderful East Anglian wildlife, or to upload your own, visit www.iwitness24.co.uk.
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