The Pelicans of St James’s Park
A few weeks ago I had an unexpectedly free day, so I decided to head in to London with my camera and see what I could find, and one of the places high up on my list of areas to visit was St James’s Park. I’ve been there before and it’s a lovely place to visit, albeit very touristy, however I’m under no illusions here - London is quite popular and whilst it can make things crowded, it also comes with one particular benefit from a wildlife photography perspective… tame wildlife!
St James’s Park itself is a nice place to spend time. It has a large body of water in the middle of it, and on that water there is probably a species that you might not expect to find in a London park; Pelicans.
What I packed
As I rarely get to see Pelicans, I knew there was a possibility that I might encounter them here, so I packed accordingly.
Nikon Z6III
I chose this as it is the lighter of my Nikon cameras which is better suited for a day walking around London.
Nikkor Z 40mm f2
This cheap plastic lens is light and has a nice character. Pairs well with any camera and the 40mm focal length is good for capturing a scene.
Nikkor Z 24-120mm f4
This is a great lens because it provides useful reach with really good image quality, and is not huge, so well worth having in your bag for situations where you might encounter subjects you want to get closer to without actually moving closer to them.
Whilst it would be better to take a lens with longer reach, the one thing to keep in mind is that a lot of the wildlife that you encounter in London parks are quite used to people and so you can get a bit closer to some of the wildlife than you might do if you were in much quieter areas. Also taking longer lenses means I would then have to take a massive camera bag. As it was, I just had a smallish sling bag with me which could fit these few items in quite nicely.
Trying to find the pelicans
Initially when I went walking around the water, I saw the pelicans in their formation gliding along the water, however they were far enough away for there to be limited photo opportunities. So I just carried on walking and did a lap of the perimeter of one half of the water.There is footbridge the bisects the water, and I crossed that - which is not easy because there are so many people trying to get nice photos with the beautiful park in the background. It’s busy but you just have to be patient. But if you use that bridge you can walk around the west side of the water. On that side, if any of the wildlife takes a break from the water, there are lots of nice fenced off areas for them to rest, and for the public to observe them. I was taking a chance that the Pelicans would do just that.
At the western most point of the water there is an island and whilst walking around that, I noticed that there were some juvenile pelicans on the island and they seemed to be spending a lot of time biting the water. They were quite far away, but with the combination of the zoom lens and a heavy cropping of the photo, I came away with some photos I liked. As you can see, these juveniles are still very brown and with a brown background it was hard to isolate them. But you do what you can, and I’m still glad I got these photos.
A lone pelican
I did not have to walk much further until I got an opportunity to photograph an adult pelican. This is one that had somehow managed to get over the fence and was just standing on the footpath preening itself. Naturally this had attracted quite a crowd of tourists and lots of young children who were desperate to try and get closer. So whilst I had a massive pelican right in front of me, it was quite tricky to get a nice photo with so many people in the background and with a creature that I was worried felt a little out of sorts at being in the spotlight. I spent a bit of time there to assess things because I hate taking photos of wildlife that feels uncomfortable, or unsafe even. I really want to be taking photos of wildlife that either does not know I (or anyone else) is there, or if they do know that people are around then they are not bothered by it in any way. It became apparent that this lone pelican did not seem to be too bothered by the crowd as it went about it’s business. But as I say, not as easy to get photos, but I liked getting some detailed close ups of the feathers. These shots are not particularly portfolio worthy, but I quite like the close ups and I would not get an opportunity in other situations to be so close to a pelican, so they are nice photos to have.
The main group
I went a bit further and found that the group of pelicans that were on the water had taken a break and were out of the water behind the fence. They were also in some quite nice light, so there were some better photo opportunities.
In these situations, I am quite happy to include some context about where I am, and to some degree I like the photo to say ‘these pelicans are in a park’. I’m not trying to fake some remote wild photo opportunity. One of the photos I took isolated a pelican quite nicely, whilst having the background quite obviously showing a footbridge. Some people would not like this, but I quite like the juxtaposition of the dinosaur like creature, and the touristy surroundings.
By this stage, the lone pelican had moved on and was trying to rejoin the others whilst also trying to escape from one of the park’s wardens, and that presented some other interesting opportunities.
Of course, most of the time you would like to craft your composition and have this wonderful portrait of a creature with perfect lighting and nice pose, but wildlife generally does not cater for that, so you have to lean in to what is presented to you. And in a London park on a sunny day in August, you might get pelicans but if you do you will almost certainly get crowds of people. You just have to be respectful to both and do what you can.
If you want to experience or learn a bit more about different species of wildlife but do not have the time or budget to travel to exotic locations, there are probably more opportunities than you might think to encounter some less common species close to home. At St James's Park you do not even have to pay an entry fee like you would at a safari park or zoo. Just go with an open mind. If the pelicans don't give you these opportunities, there are plenty of other species who will be accommodating, so concentrate on them and return another day.
