Oakley Bridges – In Passing

I wanted to check out the Harrold-Odell Country Park, and before I arrived there thought I would stop off at the Bridges over the Great Ouse at Oakley, despite the sunshine rapidly fading behind the oncoming clouds.

Fortunately there was a tiny place to park at the far end of the series of bridges, with the church at the opposite end of the straight. The sound of bird song had attracted me as I parked, since I had been driving with the sunroof open. Although I did manage to grab a couple of shots of the songbirds, they had retreated to a distance once I had  got out of the car and fetched a camera – I had some birdseed with me, so I put some out in a few spots that might prove to be both lower and with clearer backgrounds, but my subjects were obviously wise to that subterfuge and happy to collect that reward once I had departed!

Now that I had a camera out silence reined for a while and when some birds returned they kept their distance, and the sun all but disappeared, but nevertheless I persevered a while longer and got a shot of a distant windmill which I had not remembered from an earlier visit to the weir here.

I continued on to the Country Park, where I took a cursory look around outside before going into the Visitor Centre where I picked up a few leaflets to look through later, but on leaving the restaurant area to return to the car, I had not noticed how drastically the weather had changed for the worse, it was fairly tipping it down and in the short dash back to the car I was drenched – putting a very definite end to any more photography, unless there was a submarine nearby! It took the entire trip back to dry myself out, and I was very thankful I had not set up the camera here, but simply taken a walk to the water’s edge, before looking for any pamphlets. The rain did ease on my way back and was only spitting as I took the gear from the boot, and back inside. It was not a wasted trip in that it had impressed me as a worthwhile location for another occasion.

Brogborough Lake – Windy – Hardy Few

I headed for the lake at Brogborough in the hope that the wind and a few signs of sun might attract a few windsurfers onto the water. Upon arrival it was very far from crowded; compared to a good day of wind and sun on a Friday, it would not be much of an exaggeration to say the car park was deserted. But undeterred I headed for the clubhouse. Inside there was the sound of animated conversation, but no one in the main entrance area, so I headed for that corner from which the sounds of voices came – the reason for the gathering in that smaller room was soon very evident as in the corner was a roaring stove and the gathering there were enjoying its warmth and chatting animatedly.

I joined them there for a short while before venturing out to my car and began assembling my camera and tripod as there was one sailor on the lake and talk inside of others due out soon. Since originally it had been my intention of trying out my newly acquired Benbo tripod, one of whose unique features being the ability for its legs to be immersed in water safely, before I set up my more conventional tripod, I pulled this from my car and brought it in to show off its equally unusual ability of being locked into any position by the application of a single lever. I pointed out its corollary, that undoing the selfsame lock could equally, result in a total collapse with everything flopping to the ground, so one’s camera kit was somewhat compromised if care was not taken!

On this occasion I was unable to use it in anger as the means of camera attachment is solely by a 1/4in Whitworth, not the heavier professional standard 3/8th in Whitworth and all my various heads were of this larger size, and the small conversion adaptors failed to lock correctly due to their depth. This is a great shame and had been assured of these adaptors being usable, which I found not to be the case, regrettably at a cost, in using one to check it out, the overtightening had resulted in it becoming jammed and in attempting to use a screwdriver to extract it, it simply sheared! So for the present much as I wish to use that tripod, I can see myself having to either persuade the manufacturers to provide a means of using the larger standard screw thread, or returning it, which would be a shame.

Soon I had the camera mounted on my Gitzo with the gimbal head and the Sigma 150-600mm down on the jetty, so I was clear of any intervening bushes and moderately low. By now there were three windsurfers on the lake and not long after, Sam was taking to the water with a different hydrofoil board than I had seen him on before, so I was about to see how the pairing performed in the somewhat gusty wind that prevailed. It was not long before he was up and clear of the surface, though not always parallel to the water, and there were geese on the lake close to shore who had probably been enjoying the lack of human activity over the last few weeks; the sight of Sam riding high spooked them and they lacked Air Traffic Control for they headed directly across his bows, missing collision by a couple of wing-feather width! Something to which, I was not only a witness, but was fortunate enough to even capture!

By way of confirmation that the geese were not aware of windsurfing activity on this lake they were spooked a little later for a second time and also a cormorant  took off from the lake and headed elsewhere, which probably the local fish community were more than happy to watch, as these birds very often maim the fish they seek without successfully catching them to devour, much to the annoyance of any anglers.

Unusually, on this occasion, there are many near duplicate images, but the numbers I had edited neatly filled the gallery pages, so I saved much time by not culling as many as I would normally for the sake of speed in getting them up onto the blog.

Quid pro Quo – Only Narrative–No Gallery

An amusing occurrence this morning made me chuckle; but some background beforehand…

When I moved here I had a toaster that was absolutely ideal if you purchase the standard loaves from your average supermarket; the slices simply drop in to the slots and “eh, Voila!” a minute or so later, it pops up toasted. I buy my bread from Aldi – their Malted Bloomer loaves, and they come just a fraction too wide for the toaster. Incidentally they came tops from Customers.
  Now, I enjoy the company of birds, and my regular visitors are Starlings, so in the spirit of friendliness, I pull open my fridge, undo the wrapper and pull out either one or two frozen slices and carefully cut a slither from one end, putting the offcut in the morning sunshine (if available!) and load the new-sized bread for toasting. By the time my toast is ready, it is loaded in the toast rack, and whilst that is cooling, I open the back door and stand on the threshold breaking the crusts into starling-beak-sized bits and throw them outside the window so I can watch the frenzied feeding activity that follows.

On this occasion, whilst the toasting is taking place I witness lumps of moss dropping outside the back door, so out of curiosity I venture out and look up; and there are two very energetic starlings clearing my gutters of moss, I chuckle gratefully, and mumble my thanks, as the now-startled Starlings promptly take-off to seek moss elsewhere presumably for the lining of their nests, whilst I consider that it was their way of thanking me for their daily bread – ‘Starlings Gutter-Cleaning Services!’

A few minutes later I broke bread into more manageable sized pieces and threw them out to thank my feathered friends, and though they do not read blogs, at least I have offered my thanks for their generosity. For anyone who consider starlings to be simply black, I suggest they look more closely, for their coats rival Jacob’s ‘Coat of Many Colours’! When you ever have the good fortune to see their group-flying coming up to dusk, you realise these birds really are quite special – their murmurations prior to settling to roost at night are a splendid sight to see.

Marston Moretaine – Bus Stop Birds in the Bushes

 

On returning down Station Road, having posted a letter, the cacophony of birds in the bushes by the bus stop was to tempting a sight to ignore, so my return trip was at a brisker pace as I considered grabbing my medium weight tripod putting on the gimbal head and the Sigma 150-600 Sports lens and seeing what I might catch in the sunshine.

When I returned equipped, I noticed that there were the first signs of blossom on the branches, and the chirruping was still as busy as when I had passed before, so I just hoped that my presence was not going to be the kiss of death to my chances of capturing some shots of the birds I had spotted earlier.

To give myself a good chance, I had brought along some seeds to establish I was there to show my potential subjects some generosity, and I liberally spread handfuls close to the bushes but at a good distance from where I had set down the tripod.

The bushes were a mass of fine branches, which I knew would make it tough to capture the birds without intervening branches coming between myself and the birds, but there again it was probably also the reason why the birds felt moderately secure. It was not too long before some of the birds began returning, giving me a chance to see what I could capture, there seemed to be house sparrows and starlings as far as I could tell, with the very occasional pigeon coming in, but though I was not going to take shots of them in the bush, When one settled on a nearby roof ridge, I did sneak a couple of shots since it’s arrival in the bushes had caused a few starlings to make a swift exit, leaving them bare of birds.

I stayed a while and was occasionally involved in conversation from passers by, my next door neighbour heading home to collect her children from school, and a mother and young child, who informed me the bushes were hers, so I showed her and the boy a couple of shots on the back of the camera.

Search for Signs of Spring – Stewartby Lake

Having recently had the first cataract operation, I have not been out with my camera long enough to create a gallery of images, but this afternoon, as the sun was forecast to shine, I gathered a camera and three lenses and headed for the lake at Stewartby, in the hope I might be able to record the first tentative signs of Spring.

Certainly upon my arrival, it did not look too promising. Undeterred, I walked slowly in the counter-clockwise direction, with the 100mm macro on the 5D MkIII, looking into the largely hawthorn bushes to right and left; every so often venturing down paths that led down to the foreshore on my left, or the more dense right side, which had a few paths that led to the outer boundary at first, and later to a brook deep down beyond steep banks, where I did not venture!

I slowly gathered images of occasional attempts at hedge-laying; I was unconvinced that what I saw was likely to be too effective, but I am no expert. I find that very often the dying leaves in hedgerows, are full of rich colour, and on more than one occasion I captured those. There were some new memorial seats along the path, with some excellent incised carvings. I was able to capture some fresh blossom and even a lone daffodil;  I had hoped for more and better shots and some more sunlight, but nevertheless I felt rewarded by what  I had managed from such unprepossessing beginnings, and soon my phone beckoned with its harsh staccato beat to let me know that the next eye drops were due, and I still had to get back to administer them. It will be tougher yet on Saturday, when I will need to carry a freezer block with me when I visit the NEC.

A lone and very chirpy blue tit caught my eye from high in a leafless tree, but it needed massive cropping to get the shot, but it’s a tribute to the Canon lens that I was able to resolve it at all!