Chippenham Park in Infrared

We visited Chippenham Park, mostly for the wonderful snowdrop displays this year, but, following a talk on retaining colour in infrared images, I decided to give my infrared converted Canon 1D-II an outing. Working at f1.8 to prevent a hot spot means depth of field is difficult. The third image is colour (and exposure)-reversed in Lightroom giving quite an eerie night-time feel to the image

 

Madingley Snowdrops

The snowdrops are at their best at the moment, especially, as here, early on a sunny morning. Taken at f1.8 with a Canon macro lens attached Fuji mirrorless giving very shallow depth of field and interesting highlights

Wicken Fen RPS Visit

I kept my 100% record of interesting weather at Wicken Fen for RPS Nature Group visits with high winds, magnificent clouds and even a rainbow. In between this we managed some interesting birds. Some of the group got some great shots of the Hen Harrier female and Little Owl - mine come in the 'record' category! There were also fighting Coots, Kingfisher, Heron etc but all these at a 'distance'

 

Welney Ducks

After the wonderful sunrise, the rest of the day was fairly dull weatherwise but there was plenty of duck activity to keep us amused. Here Pochards, Tufted ducks and Mallard competing for space especially at the feed times and, far in the distance, my favourite ducks, the Pintails

Welney Dawn to Dusk

I had planned to record the landscape during our full day at Welney on Saturday but never expected quite such a range of colours. It would have been completed by a great sunset but, by then, the cloud had rolled in and the last image of the swans flying in was in almost total darkness.

Swans Awake at Welney WWT

We were very fortunate to have a beautiful sunrise for our early visit to Welney Wildfowl Trust reserve at Welney. We arrived just as the sky was lightening with a beautiful pink glow. As the sun came up the colours changed from pink to orange to blue. It was wonderful to see and hear the Bewick Swans as these are so much shyer than the larger noisier Whooper Swans (the two in the foreground of the second image)