Icy Conditions and January Webs Count at Paxton Pits

The first two images are taken during our January Wetland Birds count at the back of Rudd  Lake and a view of Hayling Lake with frosted Water Soldier - these were the only two view points with any numbers of birds and then Gulls, Coots and Swans with no Ducks or Geese. The other images were taken on a later walk round looking at the iced vegetation and puddles. Final couple from the start of my car journey at 8am as the sun was rising on a hoar-frosted landscape along the Hardwick Road.

Icy River Walk

As I missed one bus home after an eye appointment in Cambridge today, I walked across Coe Fen to pick up the next in Newnham. Although it was pretty chilly and lots of frozen areas, nothing to compare with my first winter in Cambridge - a picture here from the press in January 1963 of people skating in the river outside the Garden House Garden.

Happy New Year to 'Old Friends' in Toft

These two Hawthorn trees in Toft's Great Meadow (yes there are two!) are old friends that I have known and watched grow together in perfect harmony for the nearly 60 years. Their branches make a perfect shape as if they are one. I do not know if they started as one very small sapling that split or two that germinated together. In the Churchyard the Snowdrops and Aconites are showing quite a few blooms. A bit sombre in monochrome but it has been very grey recently!!

Toft Full-Spectrum Images from Misty Frosty Day

Taken on 30th November - one of the very cold misty mornings with the Full-Spectrum camera. Mostly very muted colours but, in the denser part of the wood, the autumn colours recorded well saturated presumably as infrared was somewhat filtered out by the canopy. Ted was a bit bewildered by the very cold conditions and is about to zoom off round in circles,

 

First Hard Frosts of Winter

Our village allotments are always a great place on a frosty morning with lots of different textures and shapes to explore and record.