Wordless Wednesday

Early Flutters Feeding

Yesterday started cool but the Sun soon came out so I decided to trim some of the evergreens in the front garden. Pleased I had my trusty pocket Nikon with me as I saw some 7 spot Ladybirds:



Some bees enjoying a feed on the Heather:



But what caught my eye was about five Small Tortoiseshell butterflies on the Heather:

 



One looked very much well worn and tatty but the rest appeared pristine.

Now There are Two

This is the progress on the first Cymbidium orchid to show a flower spike. Looks as though it will lose one bloom but the remaining five seem to be progressing nicely:



Joy on joy - I spied a flower spike on one of my larger Cymbidium plants:



Looks as though last Spring's dividing and re-potting is showing results.

A Frog He Has a Wooing Been

To be honest I haven't seen or heard a frog yet this year but when I had a look at the pond a few minutes ago there was plenty of frog spawn to be seen:

 

Having a quick search through recent years this looks to be the earliest by about a week.
Most years it appears around the 20th of March.

Hoping for Big Things

I spotted some seeds of giant strawberries for sale so I thought I would give them a try. The seeds spent about 3 weeks in the freezer, as per the instructions, and are now sown in pots on the kitchen windowsill. Now it is a waiting game to see whether they start growing as, apparently, they are not an easy plant to get started. The seeds are tiny as can bee seen with the two I found still in their plastic bag, now planted with the others:



The 5p coin is about 19mm across.

I wonder whether this is a similar variety to the Spanish strawberries available in shops at the moment.

Not so Grey After All

Although I set the 1200D (converted for full spectrum photography) to take B/W photos it appears that it stores all the colour information in the RAW files. This can be seen depending which program is used to process them. None of these have been adjusted for exposure or contrast, etc..

The photo as it will be seen on the camera's screen:



When pasted in Dramatic Black and White:



When pasted in Affinity Photo before processing as B/W:



And when pasted in Simply HDR:



Lots of possibilities from the same photo.

A Walk on the Grey Side

Today has been a beautiful Sunny day though with a really biting cold wind. Anyway, I decided it was good enough to take the 1200D (full spectrum converted) with us when we went for our mid-morning walkabout. It was also a chance to test out a new (to me) lens which I had bought, used, on eBay. True to the listing it is in pristine condition. A Canon EF 24-105mm 1:4 L IS USM lens. All shots were taken using live shooting which, though much slower in focussing, is the only way to be assured of properly focussed results with a camera converted to accept near IR as well as visible light as they focus at slightly different points.

The start of the walk takes us through the small estate just behind my property.
First glimpse of the village church without its scaffolding:


A bit closer view:


On to the main street and a view of one of the old trees:


Cross over the street for a quick look down Old Mill Lane:


A howling icy blast down there so back to the main street:


Cross the street again and down Mill Lane:


Until we reach a footpath which will take us to the back of the churchyard:




Then in to the old part of the graveyard to get a better view of the church:


Back on the main street looking back. The building on the left used to be our village post office and general store until it was decided to reduce the number of small post offices in the country:


A quick look at the old rectory which is now home to Penny's doctor:


Finally back to our own lane:


A walk on the grey side? Well, I had decided that this outing I would concentrate on B/W (greyscale) photography. All were taken as RAW and then processed using Affinity Photo. Lots of fluffy white clouds an hour before we went ou and a couple of hours after our return but virtually clear sky just when I wanted some cloud!