Kicking off this year's odds and sods with Starlings in a rainbow on that extreme rarity: sunshine.
It was early morning, with the sun barely cresting the tree line. We were able to get out for our morning walk as it wasn't raining. This photo is my trusty Canon 80D and Sigma 18-300mm lens zoomed in at 300mm.
Pulling back a bit.
And finally all the way back.
Oh, 2024 got off to a good start with this.
So far my cat, perhaps two neighbouring cats visiting our garden, a local fox and Tawny owl, and this trap have accounted for at least five of the beasties. Sightings of rats in our garden are getting rarer, so I think I'm winning. Two rather timid and wary rats, that I know of, are proving more elusive to catch. I've resorted to buying a lethal trap. The trap was triggered, yesterday, but no rat, sadly. Though a mouse might have triggered it, and was small enough to be within the kill bar.
90% luck, 5% field craft, 5% camera skills.
Thanks Snappy. Not much behind to clutter the background, just pavement and road ...
Lovely to see the robin looking his best BD
(Pardon the Scottish Accent)
Thank you Linda ...
Of all the berries! ....
Very good !!
nice one BD.
Billysdad said:Of all the berries! ....
That would go nicely in the Creative Captions needs your photos !
Mike
Flickr: Peak Rambler
Good point Mike, never thought of that. I won't delete it as there has been a couple of replies, but I will post it in the 'Creative Captions' section when I get back from my walk. At least it will bump that section that hasn't been used for a bit ...
Morning all. Thank you for your comments.
It's still raining. Our cat is on anti-depressants. She sits by her cat flap, staring out of it, watching the rain falling.
While flooding isn't too bad around us, I've been contemplating building an ark as just in case. Tracked down some plans. Got very odd looks at timber merchants when I asked for...
One hundred of 7 cubit by 2 palms by 1/3 palm (roughly 10' x 6" x 2") of PAR seasoned English oak20 sheets of 5 cubit by 2 1/2 cubit by a thumb (roughly 8' x 4' x 1/2") of marine ply. PS, I made the thumb up.
Harking back to drier, if not brighter days, our circular walk around Henley and the Thames. I'm jumping around a bit, but this is near the end of our walk. This bit is between the Flower pot hotel and Hambleden locks. Clouds had built up, by now, and it was quite gloomy.
The old girl can sniff out a bench from a mile away, and zeros in on it like an Exocet missile. We sat at one such bench, close to a picnic table. The walk instructions said Kingfishers could be spotted along this stretch of the Thames. Yeah right. I always take such pronouncements with a large pinch of salt. Well...as we sat there watching all manner of craft passing us, I suddenly noticed a dark, little missile, hurtling away from us across the Thames. Yep...it was a Kingfisher.
A bit later it hurtled back. This is the best I and my faithful 80D and Sigma lens could manage.
Pretty good, considering how gloomy it was and I was tracking a tiny, fast moving dot against a busy background. This is partly why I took my 80D with me. It's better than my R7 in low light/contrast situations.
When it neared our bank, it flared off to land on a piling. Absolute, 100% pure luck I even managed this photo. Naturally, it is cropped.
We couldn't have been more than 10 yards from this bird, and in full view.
Cropping out.
The footpath was rather busy, made even more so by various charity events involving lots of walkers and runners. The Kingfisher would get spooked when some walkers came by. It would disappear up or down stream but then, after a short while, reappear. It did this several times. Here is what I (well, my 80D and Sigma lens) managed.
Cropping out. Probably the best of the flying ones. A familiar sight of a blue streak hurtling away.
Alternatively, an orange streak flying across ones vision. In this sequence, the Kingfisher is flying towards a tree.
I consider the 80D was quite impressive in getting this image considering the light conditions, busy river background and Sigma lens. The lens being very good, but not up to the stellar performance of the very more expensive Canon lenses.
Of course, I have tweaked the photos a little. Increased the lighting and sharpening a tad. Not too much, otherwise the image ends up looking wrong.
Anyway, the bird flew high up into a tree.
Cropping out again.
What a climax to our walk! The Memsahib was quite ecstatic as she also witnessed the Kingfisher stop and hover, briefly, mid way across the Thames as it was flying towards us. I was too busy hunting for it through my lens to see this.
Nice set of shots and what a great location to sit and enjoy them