25 posts tagged “photo”
or perhaps it's more a case of
Like we did last summer...
These two rooks were drying out after a moderate downpour this afternoon. (You'll note that the sky is slate grey again.)
Photographic (& confessional) footnote: the birds actually took turns to shake off the water, so this is a composite of two photos taken about ten seconds apart. Pretty sure one of them is the hokey-crowky bird from an earlier post..
NB all you Cat Stevens fans: stop rocking, and put those lighters out.
I'm tempted to do a Small Obsessions post with spiders, but I'm conscious that some people get squicked by the thought of them, and Vox (bless it) doesn't let one hide sections of articles away behind a click-link. Any arachnophobes out there?
Took the camera for a stroll around the nearby park (the one occasionally swooped by Red Arrows and overstuffed Airbusses). It was largely deserted of people - the ground was pretty squelchy underfoot - but that's not necessarily a problem.
This little fellow seemed to be a bit the worse for wear, lurching around from blossom to blossom atop whatever this happens to be - some rangy relative of the dandelion, by the look of it. I think it's a carder bee - I've seen them before apparently drunk or napping in various strange places (like the top of a solar garden lamp). They sit there for a while, belching and singing bumblebee rugby songs, then rub themselves down with their hairy legs, take a breath, and fly off in various directions.
Perhaps I should investigate these plants more closely...
And apologies for the title. It was a toss-up between that and You looking at bee?! I think you got off lightly.
Photographic footnote: I normally scale the photos I post here to fit in an 800x800 pixel square, as a compromise between space and resolution. This one I've made larger, because, well, it's rather effective that way.
Well, we had some (more) heavy rain overnight, but luckily it wasn't the forecast 30 mm, and the folks in the floodplains breathed a sigh of relief.
The forecast - touch wood - says a few days of dry, even sunny weather. Mark my words - they'll be complaining about the heat by Friday...
There's part of me wants to go and take pictures of things under water, but really, the last thing folks there need is another idiot sightseer. Unless he's brought drinking water with him.
So it's out to the garden again. The bees seem to be more than a little frantic - I guess after umpteen days (and millimetres) of rain, they're well behind schedule.
Anyway, today's challenge was: try to catch them in flight. Turns out it's a great way to get lots of blurry pictures of lavender (or whatever).
Getting the timing right is a bit tricky. However, patience does pay off, eventually. This little guy is just about to take off. The blurry thing in the centre of the photo is a leg, not a wing.
Gotta admit, though, I'm really pleased with this one:
Week and a bit ago, and I'm sitting here, lost in thought, and all hell breaks loose as something rips the air a few feet over the rooftops. Grab the camera, scoot outside, because the military boys always make a pass over the runway before making their final approach.
Barely reached the garden in time to see a Typhoon (aka Eurofighter) barreling up into the low and solid clouds. Managed to get the camera up just in time to take a picture of its exhaust trail. No, I won't bother showing you that.
I figured, well, he might come back, and it's a natural time for a bit of a break anyway, so I grabbed a coat and followed the footpath down to the local field, which happens to be in line with the runway. Scan what there is to see of the horizon, listen... Nothing.
Then a growl from the east; looked round and there's... uh, one, two, three... eight things coming over the trees - barely - then turning on the smoke and before you can say Red Arrows they're disappearing into the trees at the other end of the field. The cloudbase can't be higher than a few hundred feet, and they're well below it, low enough for their smoke trails to be scudding along the ground now.
And then they're to the south, in a line, and peeling off to give themselves room to land. (See, Mr Typhoon, that's what I was expecting you to do.)
I didn't hang around much longer; I was heading back to the house when the ninth Red Arrow came in to join his mates. Must've had to stop for a comfort break, or something.
Even now, there's something about the sound of those engines that turns heads.
And when the sky is clear and they decide to have a bit of fun... like they did a couple of years ago...
