Marston Moretaine Woods Walk

           Once again, the call from beyond the confines of the house beckons, and the sun has warmed the air and banished any of the possible remnants of frost. In this time of isolation it requires little to tempt me to grab my camera once abluted and breakfasted, and head for the door. Nor is there a need to drive anywhere; I am fortunately blessed with parks and open spaces and I can travel light by selecting the LUMIX camera and my two closeup rings, and head off out..

          Closing my garden gate, I turn left, out towards the main road, and once it is safe to cross it, head off to walk to the edge of the village, where I take the path that skirts the edge of fields with hedgerows either side, and within thirty yards, the camera has found varied colours and shapes of leaves that bear the mixtures of varied Autumn hues from the still remaining greens mixed with elements of the true Season’s bronze and gold. The all important seeds for the coming year are also on show, hanging in anticipation that winds will aid their further dispersal.

          Every so often the sun is momentarily covered by passing clouds, but predominantly the sun is shining and enhancing both the hues and textures that bring joy to artists and photographers. Time passes, and particularly at this time of year the ever-changing angle of the sunlight means our view of the scenes can appear and disappear in instants!

          Luckily for me, there is a bird that shares my joy of these moments and is delighted to let me know and, anyone else within hearing distance, by shrilly sharing these moments by singing its little heart out; an energetic Robin! It even ensured it was able to reach a varied audience by flitting between different vantage points!

Beautiful Nearby Garden

               The countryside of Bedfordshire has been giving way to ever more homes in areas that were dug for its clay, with much of that excavated land giving way to lakes. Marston Moretaine, in the short time that I have lived here has had numerous housing estates spring up. The lakes formed by removing that clay have become popular for water sports; for craft such as sailing dinghies, powerboats and windsurfers, and other leisure areas devoted to fishing, walking, or birdwatching.

               Many of these activities provide subjects for my photography. From time to time I simply take a walk to capture flowers, shrubs, and insects in the gardens that front the roads of the village, and yesterday whilst capturing flowers in these gardens, I was offered the chance to cross the boundary from the pavement to take photographs within both the front garden and the enclosed garden behind the house.
               It was a treat indeed, for the owner has obviously spent many hours bringing an abundance of beautiful plants, and flowers that provide colour and varied textures to her garden, and the bees were making the most of the bonanza! It was a privilege to be offered the chance to photograph the results of her hard work. I hope the two pages of pictures I was able to capture will give her some of the pleasure it gave me in their taking, and subsequently those who visit this blog. I also hope that my photographs do justice to the hard work that has gone into creating the result I was witnessing; I feel privileged to have been given the opportunity to capture the beauty her efforts have achieved. I feel sure that those who visit my blog will share the joy I had in recording the pictures I captured.

A Walk by the Fields

          My afternoon walk on this occasion took me away from my end of the village and along the path from the main road that follows the outer bounds of the village, with the currently somewhat overgrown path of the brook. Since Spring is merging into early Summer, some of the leaves no longer have the freshness of early growth, and in some instances have signs of foreign growths on their surfaces, and clusters of larvae. I was however far more interested in young healthy growth and clusters of seeds, and signs of this season’s farmers crops. 
          I spotted a lone rabbit, and remained as still as possible to be able to get some shots before it headed once more for cover. However, there is not much to show for the length of time I spent walking, but I had specifically chosen to walk rather than drive further afield, as it was primarily a walk for exercise, so the photographs were a bonus. Provided the weather holds, my next excursion will be further afield, but the house needs my attention, as does the grass of my lawns, so my priorities must be observed! 

Brief Recent Brogborough Lake Visit

        Time is a Commodity that is very precious, and I do my best to fill the hours in the most productive and satisfying manner, which under the present situation, my most valued activity is the taking of pictures. The hours spent keep me occupied mentally and physically and I am very fortunate in that this area abounds with places that provide me with activities that are challenging, such as the windsurfers on Brogborough Lake, and sailing and powerboat aficionados, on Stewartby Lake and, slightly further afield, the River Great Ouse in Bedford which has rowers, canoeists, insect- and bird-life, as well as nearby parks and woodland. All have provided me with subjects for my cameras and lenses, whilst involving both exercise, relaxation, and mental stimulation, not to mention, albeit at healthy distances; interaction with fellow humans, some of whom have shared photographic interests.

        This gallery indicates a small but varied set of images as evidence of my observations and interest over a couple of days, which were vital for my peace of mind as there have been several situations causing me considerable stress, some of which remain unresolved; and unrelated.
        It is reassuring to note that presently it would appear I must be providing others with something of similar interest because over eleven hundred visitors seemingly have spent some time, either looking at the galleries or reading the accompanying narrative. My only regret is that so few readers leave comments (I am not looking for flattery, but reader’s suggestions of subject matter, or locations for further visits that others have enjoyed and succeeded in capturing similar subjects or activities).
        I miss human contact, and variety, so every one of my ventures armed with a camera are of great personal satisfaction, and stress-relieving, but Variety is the Spice of Life, and very much something I seek. Earlier this year, I bought a new Canon body, and it was a difficult decision, but proved to be one of merit; it proved to allow me to spend more time using my Sigma 60-600mm on a monopod without sacrificing quality, because the stability of the monopod alone when using the EOSR 6 meant I could walk with it all day without becoming tired! This means I can even part with some of my other lenses because this Sigma is so impressive.

Spring Flowers

                 This gallery of images were taken before the previously most recent group I had taken, but that was during the time I was experiencing problems getting my photo galleries up to the Web, which I am  hoping is now behind me. At least I had taken the pictures when the crocuses were open, and so I am relieved that I am now getting the gallery to see the light of day. It is really pleasing to know that I had captured this stage in the brief life of these fragile flowers.

                 There are two pages of images, yet the descriptive text is a mere two paragraphs, but hopefully the images tell their own story, so I hope this assumption is acceptable and understood, especially as the wind has left few of these fragile flowers standing. The Daffodils with their stronger stems have survived somewhat better. The pictures tell their own story, needing no further description from me.

Two Nearby Nature Locations

A successful walk around the paths of the Forest Centre after a short spell closer to home, and all in aid of exercise, and fresh air. Once again, my handy recording tool, the LUMIX FZ10002 was brought once again into service, to keep my eye and brain active, especially since the natural world does not stand still, and this season brings freshness, and the juxtaposition of the one that preceded. Sadly, due to human behaviour, Winter seems to have passed us by in this part of the UK! And it is my contention that the lack of that cleansing period of hard frosts has had a detrimental effect on our ability to limit the transmission of the Coronavirus in England.

I wonder whether we will take note of our adverse effect upon this planet and in the future, work harder to preserve this vital ecosystem. I gather there is evidence of less pollution due to our reduced travelling, and I think there was mention that the River Thames is becoming less polluted. But, in my walks of late, I have been appalled by the surge in discarded packaging on many of the routes I have been taking, and far more disturbing, the amount of extra dog excreta along many walks (on this particular trip, there were several examples that had not been even bagged, which is totally unacceptable behaviour!) — I feel ashamed of my fellow humans, and am very concerned for our children and their families if this disrespect continues for the planet which provides our home. This behaviour has to be severely curtailed, since we are also polluting the space beyond our planet with the detritus of past Space vehicles’ spent engine stages; just because a removal procedure is somewhat fraught with difficulty, should not be an excuse to simply do nothing.

I made a serious mistake on this trip, I failed to take note of the battery charge level, and hence why the trip involved two different locations, as I had to hasten home to get another fully charged one! However, it does add to the variety. It also gave the opportunity to get shots of a very different type of bee, which I spotted on the ground close to a gate, it has a very pointy proboscis, but although I have seen one before, I know nothing about it, so will spend sometime trying to learn more about it.

Overall, it was a very satisfying time in the warm sunshine, with a pleasant breeze, and some interesting shots for me to ponder later.

MM-Walk in the Fields

Having spent the afternoon of the Monday Bank Holiday really close to home to capture the Spring Growth in the hedgerows and the elusive male Orange Spot Butterflies, making the most of the warm sunshine, the following Day was destined to be largely seated in front of my Mac, spending time cropping and adjusting the images into a gallery to be put up on the blog.
This ensures I cannot spend too much time in the great outdoors and disobey the mores of Social Distancing whilst under the Covid pandemic, whilst still ensuring I keep body and brain active, and exercised regularly. On this trip, the large part of my time was spent without even a single soul visible for at least eighty percent of this period. Out in the large open field, the Marston Moretaine Church does not display its characteristic separate bell tower and seems ordinary and unassuming, beyond the shielding trees.
On three distinct occasions when I caught sight of a white butterfly with orange wing tips, they were making the most of the energy supplying sunshine to spend most of their time in the air, with only fractions of a second stationary, so with almost no time to frame them, let alone consider focussing. This is the single most frustrating aspect of using a mirrorless camera – one needs some appreciable time to follow and focus on such a subject in order to expect to obtain a reasonable shot, and with almost constant sunshine, the butterfly has the advantage! On one spell when the insect was working along the banks of the stream, it alighted on a flower probably three times in a five-minute spell, and the aggregate time it was stationary over that period never amounted to a complete single second! The really galling aspect was on that occasion, I never had a chance to get it in frame, let alone get an image!
Likewise, the stream was both deep and with overhanging grasses, reeds and other foliage, making it difficult to capture the few shots I did manage, of a pair of Mallard ducks making their way along. Fortunately, I enjoy a challenge as I need to master the controls of this particular camera, because they are far less intuitive than my Canon cameras. (I am also reminded of the saying involving 'Old Dogs' and 'New Tricks') and I freely admit that I have many more difficult-to-reach 'Little Grey Cells' that lie tantalising buried within the Cortex I laughingly call my brain! – I put this down to 'Anno Domini' and the sad truth that my dominoes are easily knocked over in a cascade!
However, the fortuitous finding of this Lumix FZ1000 Mk2 does mean that I can have it with me all day without it ever becoming a burden, and the quality it can achieve is exceptional, despite having thus far not reached that Nirvana where I find it entirely intuitive (this is when I am reminded of the mathematical term asymptote, and as if to remind myself, I accept I will only ever come close, in that Infinity always keeps its distance!)
After the trip as I reached home, a lone starling atop my roof was singing its little heart out, presumably hoping for its sweetheart to respond. Aha! My little Leica-lensed Lumix, can capture you clearly from down here!

A Marston Moretaine Walk

Yesterday I needed exercise, and the Marston Vale Forest seemed a good place to walk in sunshine and fresh air, away from contact with other humans. I took only my LUMIX fz20001 and walked along the main road to the gated entrance on the opposite side to the row of houses — encountering no one! Once through the gate, I had walked to the first viewing platform of the wetland area before I met a soul, and these were a couple in quiet conversation, who probably did not even register my presence. I climbed the steps to take in the view from this open air hide — all that was to be seen were some rooks and a lone Greylag.
The flowers in the opening and closing galleries were taken in the walk to and from the Forest Centre. The camera that recorded every image in this group was the LUMIX FZ 10002; which now accompanies me when I am not toting my heavy Benbo with one of my Canon bodies and the Sigma 60-600mm Sports lens. The irony is that the LUMIX should be easier to use, but because it has so many different functions, I find it harder to find the limited facilities I require, at speed! This is why I try to take this camera out as often as possible, so I can feel as confident as using my Canon gear. The drawback is that due to an aging brain, when I then next take out one of my Canons is that I struggle to remember how to do something that used to be second nature!
Initially the route I took kept close to the outer boundary of the reserve, and by pure luck I found myself taking a picture on the far side of a brick structure I had photographed only a few days back; it still has me puzzled as to its original purpose. I suspect it is a remnant from an erstwhile railway line, but viewing using Google Earth did not expose any further answer.
Today’s photo trip does show that Spring is definitely coming on, spurred by the several days of welcome warm sunshine. The wind has also moderated over the last couple of days. At various points along my circular trip, work upon the Covanta Incinerator can be seen with its tall cranes highly visible in red against the blue sky. Of more personal interest, I spotted my first butterfly of this year, the Peacock. The variety of colours and textures is very much in evidence at this time of year, hence why I enjoyed that afternoon trip; young leaves often exhibit far greater texture in their early stages on growth than their later full size. The variety of textures I found in dead wood, dried, crazed soil and discarded bark, and the curves of the paths are all featured in the gallery of images from this walk with a camera. Coming away from the Park, effectively bookended the gallery with what caught my eye once back on the road back to my house in the front gardens I passed.

Bumble Bee Rescue

This item has been delayed by a couple of days, but was an episode which I felt I did my bit for humanity.

It began by my spotting an almost comatose bumble bee by the locked front door; obviously it had been considering a way to reach the outside world, but had been thwarted by the lack of sustenance in the house. I have no idea how long it had been there, but certainly, long enough to try to conserve its energy, with a hope it might eventually be able to return to the wide open expanses to which it had been accustomed.

It was in luck, because I had its best interests at heart, I hastily went to the kitchen for a jam jar and some stiff card to construct an ambulance for its passage to the Outside World. Having transported it to the next stage of that passage, by placing it carefully on my front hedge in the carefully crafted emergency rescue plan of giving it an eventually higher platform for its flight, I returned to the kitchen to prepare some restorative medicine in the form of a dessert spoon with a teaspoon of sugar and a few drops of water.

However, the bee had not waited for me to complete my plans for its takeoff, it had simply decided terra firma was preferable, so I carefully placed the elixir alongside his weakened body, and hoped he would find his survival instinct would kick in and he would try to take a drought from my spoon. Initially, he lacked trust in this giant despite being wounded not at all by my transporting him back to his world, thus far. I moved the spoon and it’s life-giving elixir closer.

I forgot to mention that I had wasted no time in grabbing my EOS R, attaching the 24 to 70mm with its macro facility, before coming outside to record my hopefully successful rescue this vital member of our joint ecosystem deserved.

So, though the full story of its initial start on the road to recovery had been the top of the hedge, at least my arrival to witness his new start point was early enough to show his lethargy, despite my ministrations with the sugar solution offering, it still distrusted my motives, until presumably it sniffed the recognisable aroma of the sugar, and decided I was not as evil as it had previously presumed.

Soon I could see that it had begun to suck up this welcome nectar, but it tarried very briefly before moving away and for the first time since my rescue attempt had started, it unfurled its wings and gave a slight burst, which for me was heartwarming, and a few moments later I was thrilled to see it take to the air, no last circuit to say thank you, just off into the distance, thankful to be back in its own territory — airborne once more.

Life in my Marston Moretaine Garden

It would seem my Buddliea took longer to arrive this year than in earlier seasons, and perhaps, it knew this was a strong likelihood, so delayed producing its bloom, because within days of flowering and attracting pollinators; bees and butterflies, the British Weather gave us an extended period of high winds, and to a lesser degree, rain.

I took advantage of the arrival of mainly a handful of butterflies, and to a lesser degree bees, to take my camera out with the Canon 70-200mm lens and the Sigma 2x Extender, and did my best to capture their efforts to feed on the rich nectar they sought. There were periods during which I had to patiently await a lull in the gusty wind that was battering my plum tree and Buddliea ferociously – I had already lost two dozen plums before they had ripened, and this number rose still higher, despite my earlier efforts to try to lessen the amount of movement the branches were accorded, by tying them to a large clay pottery flower pot.

The three Butterfly species I see most are the Small Tortoiseshell, Red Admiral and Cabbage White.The butterfly’s response to the wind was to lay their wings as flat as possible against the leaves to weather the gusts, then in the few lulls get back to  delving into the florets. From my point of view, I was trying to get the most possible use of the loaned 2x Converter to help me decide whether to make the purchase. I was certainly finding that overall the issue that gave me greatest concern was how efficient autofocus would be when using the Converter.

The heartening result overall, was with the EOS R, although I would still often have to obtain initial focus manually, once I was close, the camera took over and locked on with ease. By the end of the afternoon I was convinced, and contacted Sigma to send me the invoice, as there was no need for me to return it!

Although at first sight, there may seem numerous duplicates within the gallery, there are subtle differences, and I was trying to see just how well the focus was maintained, and considering the amount of movement I was involved in trying to keep track, the camera was definitely less troubled, and I was able to recompose the images easily in post processing, especially when I was particularly pleased with some of the shapes formed by the leaves that allowed me to create good compositions, What that meant was that invariably the overall crop whilst taking was not tight, despite the greater enlargement, the quality of the mirrorless body’s files was still excellent, which has been a real benefit.

Readers of this blog will have noted how I have had to adapt my way of shooting, especially when panning, to accommodate to some of the different characteristics involved between my dSLR bodies such as the 7D MkII and 5D MkIII. Canon remain tight-lipped over my suggestions, with this issue, but admit I am not alone in suggesting a modification to the way in which bursts are handled by this camera to lessen the impact of the lag between the image in the viewfinder when a panning sequence is shot. The expensive but obvious alteration would be to have two parallel processors; one for Viewing, one for Capture, my suggestion however was to mitigate the effect by discontinuous sampling of the signal reaching the Viewfinder, as in my humble opinion this could be achieved by a separate setting for panning operations. Time will tell. The technique involved would not be too dissimilar from image stabilisation, and could be linked to the difference in inertia involved in the camera’s motion.

Sigma 2x Converter Test using the EOS R Body

Sigma kindly lent me their 2x Converter, fundamentally for me to see how it performed with their excellent 60-600mm Sports lens. By way of background, I had purchased the 1.5x Converter straight off as I knew of it’s capabilities from my using it on earlier Sigma lenses, but till now the loss of exposure has put me off because  of the frequency of operating in less than ideal lighting conditions.

My experience of using the EOS R in similar conditions has shown me that the full-frame EOS R has a higher pixel count than my 5D MkIII so Noise is far less, and I knew that that earlier body, when I was favoured with enough light, the combination performed well with the addition of the 1.4x Converter. So, if my surmise was correct it would be worth buying the more powerful converter, but the risk was too great, hence why I asked Sigma for the opportunity to check it out. Generously, they were happy to oblige.

From my initial testing with one averagely light day at nearby Brogborough and the 60-600mm Sports lens capturing shots of a Windsurfer on a hydrofoil, it looked promising, but so far conditions have not given me the chance of further evaluation, so I dug out my 70-200m f/2.8 lens and using the 2x Converter, I took some shots in the garden of butterflies, and from that learned I needed f/8 rather than f/5.6, but that would have pushed the ISO too high, but at least it showed promise that given better lighting it would be fine (proof if I needed it can be seen by looking at the bee shots in the gallery, where my chosen shutter speed was inadequate when they were in flight, and improving the ISO would simply have not offered any benefit, since though they might be sharper, the extra noise would wipe that out!

Overall thus far, my impression is that the EOS R has improved sufficiently that it looks as if my Bank Balance is due to take a hit, but hopefully with just a bit more sunshine, I will be swayed and will add this to my armoury of accessories that will allow me to wait before plunging for a wide aperture long prime lens. With any luck, if wind and sun combine in the next week, Sigma and I may well be in happy conjunction as Seller and Buyer respectively!

Floral Interlude – Marston Moretaine

With some time to kill, and the need to remain close by, I take my camera and wander along the pavement capturing some of the flowers bathed in warm sunshine, that are displayed in many of the front gardens bordering Station Road.

And occasionally I take a closer look in some of the many tubs that add colour to some of the roads that join the main road. I find that among these shots there are often useful backgrounds for creating greetings cards for relatives and friends to carry messages of good wishes for birthdays and other anniversaries.

On this occasion, sadly I found that one of my lenses is in need of a service as the focussing did not work every time , so after only the first couple of shots, I had to return to swap it for another, so sadly that is another bill to pay! I returned to the task in hand and continued up Station Road, looking for suitable shots that could be taken from the pavement.

I also take such opportunities to capture bees, hoverflies and butterflies, but on this occasion I saw no bees or butterflies, and considering the buddies are now in blossom, I am surprised that I only saw a Cabbage White, and only flies and overflies, so this gallery is almost entirely of flowers.

Marston Moretaine — Life in the Hedges

Every day people stroll, run or cycle along roads with rarely a glance to the right or left, often in worlds of their own, with scant regard for the small creatures that abound in the hedges, along the low walls, or in the grass alongside the pavements. Yes, many will admire some of the brightly coloured flowers, or the neatly trimmed lawns, but when cars or bikes are passing, there are often sounds to be heard; obviously birdsong, but at lower levels there can be the gentle hum of bees. Even without those sounds, there is activity a-plenty.

I had spotted the bees, as I walked to the Post Office and back, so I broke off from what I had planned and took out a camera and over two short sorties with two different lenses set out to capture what was there in just a short stretch of the main road.

There were bees, tiny moths, a ladybird, spiders, one minuscule pale insect I had never seen, hoverflies — some were too agile and shy for me to capture.   We rely on many yet give them barely a passing thought but, when you look closer at some, you would see that many of these creatures have bodies of incredible complexity, and possess skills we can only dream of possessing. I can highly recommend stopping by a hedgerow in the early evening of a warm summer day when you see a hoverfly, and just watch their flying skills, as they lift off from a leaf perform darting swoops, the stop, hover a moment, often swing through ninety degrees at the same spot, then climb vertically, and stop again. I have found that in areas of mixed light and shade, they will often hover in the sunlit spot, then get mobbed by other hoverflies who then take over the same point in space.

On this occasion it was too early for that behaviour, and one hoverfly simply relaxed, preened itself with its long legs, then poohed! The tiny moth I spotted was barely two millimetres in diameter, and way too energetic for me to capture. And the ladybird simply burrowed deeper in the hedge, and never reappeared. Gerald Durrell, author of ‘My Family and Other Animals’ had far more exotic ‘mini-beasts’ on Corfu, but English hedgerows are far from bereft of tiny insects that are interesting to study. I would highly recommend some words from WH Davies — ‘What is this Life, if full of Care, we ne’er have Time to Stop and Stare’. A day or so back I took some shots of water boatmen — these are tiny creatures that can be found on streams and lakes, who can walk on water, and they skip along the surface with incredible agility.

When I photograph flowers, I very often try to capture insects that either pollinate those flowers or search for smaller prey who feed therein. There is a world of life within a hedge, and I gain much personal satisfaction in taking photos of this world; it is endlessly fascinating, and highly therapeutic.

Fruitless Wait for Greylag Overflight

Due to the weight of my Benbo tripod, I drove along Station Road to be opposite the Kissing gate entrance to the Marston Vale Forest Centre.

I have been using the dusk to await the evening departure of the Greylag Geese from Stewartby Lake to their nighttime resting place, but their route is not entirely predictable, governed by the wind direction and the appearance or not, of the sun. On this occasion the afternoon and early evening was cloudy, with the occasional break to a misty glow. Quite early on a small group of birds came across, but I was unsure due to them flying at such a distance and away from me, I could not be sure whether they were Canada Geese or Greylag.

Later sadly it turned out to be Canada Geese, and they decided on the worst direction possible in relation to where I was stationed as not only were they distant, and their formation untidy, the background was of power pylons and trees, and this came way into my wait and was extremely scrappy and nary a single image was worth salvaging!

Up till that time, and beyond, I captured the fading colours of autumn brambles and blackberries, a small flying insect, and some of the cloud formations, so not entirely wasted time, but no Geese in Vee Formation!

Marston Moretaine – Front Gardens and Roadside Flower Boxes

             Station Road could be described as the main floral route through the village of Marston Moretaine, especially at this point in time, after the rains and following sunshine. April is renowned for showers, and as I took a walk at lunchtime with my camera, it was because of my observation earlier that a sudden spurt had taken hold of my privet hedge requiring a heavy pruning, that caused me to look slighter further.

            I brought along a small rubberised groundsheet, so that I could kneel to to choose a low viewpoint close to the flowers that were to fill my viewfinder. I had chosen the 100mm Macro, but in case I needed a wider angle lens, I took my camera case along to have access to a 24-70mm and hold the groundsheet.

            I had already asked permission earlier to visit one garden, and seeing a lady tending her garden, and seeing some likely floral colour, I enquired of her too, and she kindly also gave me permission, and having taken a couple of shots duly showed her the results on the back of the camera, I took a further couple of shots and was about to leave when she suggested there might be shots around the back, and there were two more subjects there, so I thanked her after showing those results, and moved further up the road looking for more signs of late Spring sprouting.

            There were a few more stops on the way to the house that I had spotted two days before and where the ‘Love Lies Bleeding’ were where I had already had approval to enter their front garden.

            The resultant gallery from this walk which took me up towards the shops and left, for a few gardens before the return trip to see whether I had missed any items of interest, and with a slight detour via a path to the far end of the Squire Road cul-de-sac and back in to create the gallery, the result follows.

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.

St. Mary’s Church Visit - in the Snow

At last some sunshine to accompany the Snow! Snow on a cloudy day is just not worth photographing, but really comes alive when the sun catches some of the crystals; the sparkle gives the snow form, and life, and this morning was a good time to walk to Marston Moretaine’s parish Church, which is just a smidgeon different from many village churches, the main structure lacks a tower. A short distance away and out of kilter with the church proper stands the buttressed tower, there is a weird myth surrounding this involving the Devil lifting the tower and tossing it away from the body of the building, and thus far, I have seen no real explanation for the odd juxtaposition of the two structures, but my cursory and ill-informed observation would suggest that both appear to be of different ages and style.

The history, or lack thereof does mean that it is very different from the average Parish Church, so merits interest. I decided it was worth capturing whilst it still has a carpet of snow surrounding it, so I took a wander around, sadly some more interesting views would have to await a later afternoon, as several of the views I was able to capture whilst the snow was moderately fresh were not lit to advantage, and having made a single circuit, clouds were massing to remove that vital ingredient sunshine, which was marked by the ringing of my phone bearing a message from one of my daughters.

The Tower appeared to be a meeting point for pigeons and doves, and the graves themselves were severally decorated with Spring flowers, but sadly the frosts and the burden of snow had caused these floral tributes to take on a sad demeanour, but it was definitely apparent from their numbers, that relatives were keen to keep their forebears in mind. One such was a balloon gently swaying to the light breeze with it’s handwritten message of love to a departed grandparent. What I noticed which was a surprise was how several were marked with headstones whose dates were surprisingly recent considering there is a planned new area for graves on the outskirts of the village, which pre-supposed that this cemetery was close to capacity, I therefore concluded that some must be family plots.

It was a brief visit, but I had been waiting for that vital conjoining of snow and sun, and was not disappointed, I also managed yesterday to gather some small expanses of virgin snow in case they could later be used to adorn a future Christmas Card, since for the last few years, snow has been notable for its fleeting appearance in our winters, and I always enjoy using recently captured images.

An Abundance of Berries – Portent of Cold Snap?

In Marston Moretaine currently there is a strong showing of berries; red and gold, in the past this has been interpreted as a forecast of a cold Winter, so I wonder whether the bush telegraph is foretelling this as an outcome? Certainly as I took a late afternoon stroll to see whether the bridge over the old A421 might prove to be a good viewpoint to capture a future sunset, the birds were certainly very active and vocal, was their chatter all to do with their reading of the berries, and the possible onslaught of a harsh winter, and Nature’s response in offering the berries to fortify them in the time ahead?

As the sun broke through clouds then hid again, I captured the last of the leaves that still clung to the bushes as the majority now carpeted the ground, the berries provided foreground for the path that tunnelled beneath overhanging branches, and added colour to the black and rust, hooped railings of a bordering garden that shielded the trellis beyond.

As I returned with last of the sun’s rays only catching the very topmost branches, house sparrows flitted back and forth between adjacent bushes chattering incessantly amongst themselves and woodpigeons gently murmured but generally stayed hidden and stationary, geese overflew as did starlings and gulls, and the geese in the gardens of Moretaine Manor occasionally squawked in some local squabble by the water’s edge behind the hedge. I had hoped that as I was out and about with a camera I might be graced by a reasonable sunset, but that was not to be, but on hearing the chatter from the sparrows I had nipped to the nearby car and changed from the 24-70mm to the 100-400mm before there activity subsided for the evening, thus getting a few shots of them and a lone well-preened robin, which had he courtesy not to hide behind the tangle of hawthorn branches.

Buzzing Ivy by Moretaine Manor

I knew there was only a slim chance of windsurfing activity at Brogborough as there had been a big event over the weekend on the South Coast, so I put minimal camera gear onto my bike, so that the journey might at least serve as exercise, and any way I could check out signs of insect activity lakeside, then choose a different location thereafter. On arrival there was no action, so spotting that some of the windsurfing wetsuits had blown from the line, I did my bit and rehung them on the line to give them a chance to dry. Before cycling back, I cycled past the club area and headed to Lidlington, where a single pink rose swayed in the breeze with an ichneumon wasp resting on it, there were also a few what I took to be red wild roses, and a short distance away a tree laden with crab apples.

I took a few shots here, one of which was a giant concrete Lego Brick; an increasingly frequent sight in this neck of the woods due to the nefarious parking of itinerant travellers’ vehicles who seem to delight in wrecking any available green space that they can find before the authorities can muster the paperwork to evict them. I then returned to take a wander close by Moretaine Manor, which is now a hotel.

At the entrance is a large ivy bush, and it was alive to the silent activity of late pollinators, so my journey was undoubtedly not wasted. I put the Canon 7D and 100mm Macro to use capturing them and was there for a reasonable time before cycling back to create another gallery of images. The majority of the pollinators appeared to prefer the shade to the sunlit side of the bush, which meant having to operate at 1000 to 1600 ISO making it difficult to freeze them when in flight, and I am certain that if I were not there with a camera they’d have been in the warmth of the sunny side! I am convinced that all wildlife is fully aware of photographers’ kit, as when I take a long lens to a kingfisher spot, they perch close by me knowing that I cannot focus so close, or they sit on a branch at a reasonable distance from me, but shielded by a thicket of intervening branches and leaves.

But my trip did provide both exercise and some images, so it was an hour well-spent, and provided me with some card imagery as well as fresh air, now I need a piece of kit called Printer Potty ordered from the Internet to arrive so that I can put my printer back together, as it is taking up valuable space in the kitchen, stripped right back to its chassis! For anyone facing an overflowing ink reservoir on their printer, I cannot recommend the man selling this item, enough; he is absolutely charming, exceedingly helpful, and the product receives excellent reviews.