Saturday 31st March 2012, 10.00am (day 219)
A husband-and-wife team, I guessed. Saw no sign of ducklings, but it looks to me like they’re on the case.
Being 42
Life, one day at a time
Category Archives: Flora/Fauna
Bumblebee in Guinness glass
Friday 23rd March 2012, 4.35pm (day 211)
The weather remains beautiful and springlike. I’d say it has brought out the bumblebees but actually, for some reason this year there has been a real crop of big, fat dozy bumblebees doing the rounds for about two weeks now. This one I trapped in a glass to get it out of the pub, but then couldn’t resist using it as a model for about twenty photos during which it got increasingly pissed off and eventually started zooming up and down the glass so fast I couldn’t photograph it any more, so I let it go.
This shot I love, though, it looks like a little mouse with a single wing. You’re viewing it from behind: the two legs to the right are its rear two legs; its head is facing away from the camera, and its left wing is obscured because it lies along the line where the glass meets the paper. The magazine underneath it gives an interesting background. Yeah, I’m happy with this one. Nice photo to end a good week.
University of Manchester campus
Thursday 22nd March 2012, 1.55pm (day 210)
I know I did this theme a couple of days ago but there really wasn’t any other photo today which encapsulated what was an absolutely glorious spring day.
Incidentally, those who know the Manchester campus may be bemused as to where this is, because it really must be one of the least green campuses in Britain – there is hardly any green space, plus this bloody big road running right through the middle of it. Trust me however: this is just outside Blackwell’s, under the ramp to the shopping precinct and opposite the Kilburn building.
Mini-jungle, Keighley Road
Wednesday 21st March 2012, 8.50am (day 209)
It’s nice to have a change of scale occasionally. I can quite see this as a luxuriant jungle, hard up against some crags. If a condor were to be flying past in the middle-distance, or there were a little human figure in the foreground, about to plunge into the darkness beneath the trees, it would not look too wrong.
Actually this is a patch of moss on the top of the stone retaining wall between the A6033 and the Hebden Water, a minute’s walk from my house: total area covered by this photo, less than a square foot. How much of the world do we so often miss seeing?
Rook and daffodils
Tuesday 20th March 2012, 9.15am (day 208)
Had this one all lined up, as the bird perched on this fence pole, but then it moved just as I pressed the shutter. Ah well, it’s still interesting, though it might have done the decent thing and flown down to the ground in front of the pole instead of behind it.
Girl and birds by the river
Friday 16th March 2012, 9.15am (day 204)
Yes, I know it’s blurred. But one of these days I’ll take a photo like this and it’ll be sharp, and then the world is my oyster 🙂
Sheep quintet above Longsleddale
Monday 12th March 2012, 10.00am (day 200)
Worked yesterday on the way home so I could get a day’s walking in today, but the views were disappointing again – despite a good forecast, cloud obscured most things above about 1,500 feet today.
I did like this little group of sheep, however, who arranged themselves across the shot like an 80s indie band on an album cover. There’s the lead singer down in front, the tough bass player behind, the lead & rhythm guitarist stylishly ignoring the camera in the centre. Not sure what the job of the one on the right is. It’ll probably be the synth player who’s on his way out after this album, like Viv Savage from Spinal Tap, say.
By the way, today’s the 200th day of this blog: I will put up some more ‘Best of the Rest’ but not tonight.
Lille Lungegårdsvannet, Bergen
Wednesday 22nd February 2012, 4.25pm (day 181)
This is an artificial lake in the centre of Bergen, by the art museum. It’s actually not that cold here (although the weather was still revolting today), but there’s still this scrim of ice on the surface of the lake, enough to support these birds’ weight and provide a nice optical illusion effect to add to the other nice patterns and colours on this shot.
Pigeon meeting
Sunday 12th February 2012, 1.20pm (day 171)
“OK everyone. We just missed our scavenging targets this morning so I’ve adjusted the afternoon rota accordingly. Frank, Paddy, you two are on tourist duty in the square. Simon – fish & chip shop. Who wants to take the path at the side of the river? I know, I know, there’s a lot of those bastard ducks around today, but that’s why we need someone flexible, not afraid to take risks. Cecilia – I think you’re ready.”
Wrapped up against the cold
Wednesday 8th February 2012, 8.45am (day 167)
As someone who grew up in the South but now has firmly settled in the North, I do have a certain sympathy for some of the anti-Southern sniping which takes place up here and which is often deserved. However, on this occasion the reason the papers are all saying how crap the weather is in the South, and not mentioning the North, is not some innate metropolitan bias: it’s simply that at the moment the South (being closer to the very cold air settled over Europe) is having bad weather, and we’re not.
Having said all that, there was a deep, damp chill in the air today; these dogs were not the only ones wrapped up against the cold as the kids walked to school.
