Has a similar thing happened to you?

I was looking forward all week, to finish work and head off to my local nature reserve. On my arrival i settled on a bank of a small lake, there where damsils and dragonflies everywhere. After about 15 mins a goup of woman with about 10 children arrived, so i moved on to another spot much further away. I had done this because i'm a parent myself so i'm very aware that nowadays you must be careful where you point a camera or binoculas, as this may cause concearn for parents.
Whilst shooting some butterflies a vehicle pulled up behind me with two rangers. They explained to me that they had a complaint of a man with a telephoto lense, that may have taken pictures of their children. I was the only man around with this type of lense. Lucky for digital i was able to show them my images. But the complaint had made me so angry because not once did my lense go anywhere else but into reeds looking from the bank into the lake and facing down from the bank.
My intentions this evening, was to spend a few hours here, but this had spoilt it all
I stayed for about half an hour. Whilst leaving i decided to approach the group of ladies, when i asked did they make a complaint about me, they were quit surprised and responded with, "no! of course not, we seen you taking pictures facing the water..........we feel awfuly guity that you decided to move away because of our noisey children". They were very shocked after i told them what had happened and the reason i had actually moved away. They even offered me a glass of wine to cheer me up.
Anyway i am obviously very upset. Was this lady who reported this blind to nature? After all we were on a nature reserve. But some good came of it the wardens liked my pics and asked would i donate them to the reseve, of course im pleased to, so a good thing did come of it.

We should all be aware of these problems whether using a camera out in the public.

Thanks for reading.

I'm sorry for your bad experience Do we get to see the dragon/damselfly pics?

Thanks Alan. I had just got there, settling myself in (new to this stuff) so only this the rest are blurred, especialy the close ups, due to a breeze and lack of knowledge.

HOSTED PHOTO
please log in to view hosted photos in full size.

But here are my butterflies i took

https://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthre​ad.php?t=194506

That was nice of them to offer the wine! I have never had anything like that happen to me but I am sure I'd be plenty annoyed too!
At least you will have your images at the reserve!

afraid thats the way the world is going - in the present climate I wouldnt point a camera anywhere near a kid.Good thing you were using a digital camera - they might have ripped the film out!

Never happened to me but a sad situation for sure. It's tough to put it behind you and move on but that's about all you can do. People sure can be strange today. Use to be folks would just come over and make sure you weren't doing anything. Now they get on their cell phones and call the authorities.

Thanks for your sympathy guys.
It is very sad that we have to look out for our children in this way, and a big worry it is. But this lady was simply over the top and totaly out of order. It makes me wonder if she does this to everone with a telephoto lense or DSLR even.

Cheers Dave, My partner has just said te same to me..............."Go back tomorrow Darling"

I cannot believe this story. I have a shot in my archives of a little boy dipping with a pond net at the local reserve. It's a nice human interest picture. People who think that is wrong read too many tabloid newspapers, are very sad, and should get a life.

Thanks eccles, i couldn't believe it myself. The rangers felt embarased as well, but i suppose they had to check the complaint out.

thats a bit of a nightmare. especially seeing as it was on a nature reserve where you EXPECT to see people with cameras/binoculars....​..
never had anytyhing like that happen to me... a lot of the kids around my house actually follow me around when i'm out taking shots I know most of their parents tho ... even if i'm in Glasgow taking shots i've never been challenged..... I did have one policeman stop to talk to me when i was taking shots.... but he only wanted to see my 100-400 L because he was a photographer himself

I sometimes leave my camera at home when taking my son to the park in fear of anything like that.

Id love to get some real nice shotsof him playing but always end up taking the P&S so nobody thinks im taking secret pics of any other kids.

Its a sad unfortunate world we live in.

Especially when on the front of a national newspaper there was a photo of 2 convicted peadofiles filming a 2 year old girl in her local park.

Where were her parents?

You do have to be careful and it makes me angry that im made to feel guilty before ive even packed the camer in my bag.

Rant over!!

Sadly this kind of thing doesn't surprise me anymore. The media thrives of this kind of irrational fear to sell copies. If you apply a little common sense then you'd realise anyone wanting to take photos of that nature would do everything they could not to be noticed - so a DSLR + huge telephoto isn't the way to go. But then common sense didn't seem to apply at my son's school when digital cameras were banned from the nativity play but film and video were not...

thank heavens for digital proof of where our lenses are pointed! I have heard muliple stories of paranoia in women around photographers, both about their children and about themselves!

Fear in photographers who wish to take photos at a sports field of child athletes, to sell to the parents under request, and other parents who think they merely are pedophiles or kidnappers!

Photographers taking photos of flowers in public gardens, being confronted by women who think the lens was aimed at their posterior as they happened to walk by, and calling in a passing police officer to deal with the 'pervert'!

Yes, there is reason for caution (there always has) but paranoia and suspicion are so prominent today. Fortunately we can easily prove our innocence via LCD to police officers called in, and maybe put the fear of coutercomplaint of harrassment in those who accuse us falsely in spite of our proclaimations of innocence before the police officer is called in!