Half a Moon

Thursday night I noticed the Moon showing clearly with a lovely pale orange colour. Needless to say by the time I had the camera set up on its sturdy tripod there was plenty of cloud about:



Try as I might with every setting I could find on the camera it refused to reproduce the true colour.

Every now and then the cloud cover cleared so I took a short piece of video.
Canon 70D with 400mm zoom lens plus 3 times digital zoom in the camera:



Taking a quick look at the Moon as we normally do it appears to be virtually stationary, only noticing it has moved after some minutes have passed. With the camera rock steady the video shows the true 'movement' as the Moon and Earth career through space. The Moon is orbiting the Earth at over 2000mph.

Memories Are Made of This

'Memories Are Made of This' says the title of a song sung by Dean Martin

It's sometimes surprising what can make a memory from years ago rise to the surface. Recently a couple of riders and their horses were trotting round the block. When we went walk-about there was the evidence in the road:



What strong memory can possibly be associated with a pile of horse dung?

One Summer near the start of the 1950s I was sent to stay with my maternal grandmother and great grandmother. A decision I liked as I generally enjoyed visiting there. The only thing I didn't take kindly to was one particular chore I had to carry out. Milk and coal, as with many other products, was delivered by horse and cart. After they had visited I would be given a hand shovel and bucket and sent out to collect the still steaming piles of horse manure. Why? Granny would transfer it to a sack which was dangling in an old oak water butt. The resulting manured water being used to feed her roses.

Oh and no. I wasn't tempted to repeat the exercise this year.

Fill Those Baskets

Not just humans gleaning an Autumn harvest from the hedgerows. Recently the Ivy around the village has been swarming with bees making the most of a final harvest of pollen, leaving with bulging pollen baskets. Some Ivy growths have so many bees visiting that the hum from their wings can be heard well before nearing the plant.









I have noticed there seem to be far fewer wasps around this Autumn. Normally by now they would also be swarming over the Ivy but I have only seen the occasional one.

Weevil

Whenever I fold back the hasps while unlocking the garage or shed doors I never know what will be hiding there. Sometimes a moth, sometimes a spider. This time it was a weevil:



By the time I had fetched the 50D with its macro lens I only managed three focus stacked photos before it made a dash for cover.

Tuesday Teaser

This was the modified photo I showed last week:


It was just a photo of a recently ploughed field:


Many thanks to those of you who had a go at identifying it.

I wonder what you will make of this week's teaser:



Any guesses in the comments please.
They will be revealed, along with the original photo, next Tuesday.

Keeping Warm? + Sunrise

Early morning - A group of Starlings clustered on one chimney stack:

Baa Baa Black Sheep ....

Nice to see some back in the paddock at the end of the lane:









Trying to work out whether Penny is a sheep? 
Right colour but no wool or horns.