For the old pics (1970/1971) I used a Russian Zenit 3M SLR. This was the cheapest SLR available in 1968 or 69 (not sure which) when I bought it. I had 2 lenses the standard Russian 50mm f3.5 lens and a Dixons Prinz 135mm f3.5 telephoto lens. Later I added a Prinz 400mm f6.3 lens.

For the current pics I use/have used, a cheap Bridge camera. It is a Konica-Minolta DiMAGE Z3. This is only a 4M pixel camera but has 12x optical zoom (35mm equiv. 35mm-420mm) and quite good macro features.

As of 22/04/2010, I have bought a second hand Fuji S100FS bridge camera. It is an 11.1M pixel camera, has 14.3x optical zoom (35mm equiv. 28mm-400mm) and has macro and super macro modes similar to the DiMAGE Z3. It has much more of a DSLR look and feel than the Z3.

June 2019 has added a Nikon P900 bridge camera. It has 83x optical zoom (35mm equiv. 24mm-2000mm) and very good vibration reduction (VR).