Sunspot AR2781

Last night the Moon gave me a photo opportunity (see previous post). Today it was the turn of the Sun. I particularly wanted to see whether I could capture an image of the first decent Sunspot of the new solar cycle.



You can see it at about 7 o'clock on the above photo. To give some idea of size - the Earth is smaller than the top dark blob. Photo taken with the Canon 70D fitted with 100-400mm zoom and, most importantly, a solar filter to cut down the light from the Sun by something like 10,000 times making it safe to point the camera directly at the Sun.

A closer crop:

Moon

When I went outside to clear a spider's web from a video camera I could see the Moon was clear and glowing orange. Just had to take a photo or dozen of it. Took lots. I think this one came out best after cropping and processing in Affinity Photo:

Hello Jenny

As I looked out of the kitchen window I could see the familiar darting motion of a small Jenny Wren. They don't spend much time in the open, usually moving rapidly from cover to cover while searching for spiders and insects to eat. I only had the Nikon, hand held, set to full zoom as I tried several time to get a snapshot. Luckily the Wren spent a short while in the open.





Even with full zoom I had to make small crops. As far as I can gather the Wren is the third smallest British resident bird weighing about the same as a £1 coin.

Monday Mystery

Last week's close up



showed part of



which was correctly identified by Adrian, Dave and Kev as an oven glove. Thanks to all who had a go.I first discovered Coolskin® at least a decade ago when they were on sale on a well known satellite shopping channel. I liked the idea of having a fingered glove rather than a mitten for better grip and control. They were advertised as being in use by several fire brigades so I gave a pair a try. Excellent. After taking a hot dish out of the oven the outside of the glove can be too hot to touch but the inside is barely warm. Just watch out for scalding steam as that can penetrate the glove.

Once again a close view



Want to have a guess as to what it is? Please leave any guesses in the comments. They will be revealed, along with the answer, next Monday.

Sunset

With the clocks changing last Sunday we were just in time to catch a short lived Sunset on the way back from our after tea walk.

Monday Mystery

Last week's mystery object



was correctly identified by Kev Scott, Kris and Dave as a feeder designed for woodpeckers. Well done. The wooden 'steps, are to give something to grip on to and the long depth under the feeder is to give support when they press their tails to aid grip. My thanks to all who had a go.

Back to a close view this week



If you would like to guess what it is please leave your guess in the comments. Any will be revealed, along with the answer, next Monday.

Then and Now

Remember when I had the enormous Leylandii cut down and left a tall stump? Here it is as it was in April 2018 when I planted a couple of Virginia Creepers and wondered how many years it would take before I got a decent Autumn colour show from them.



and how it looked today



Pretty good for two years growth considering some of it was accidentally cut down when I had someone in to do some strimming in that area of the garden! I need to do a bit of re-training to get it to cover some areas. Strange, most of the growth seem to be on the North facing side. Maybe I should plant another one of the South facing side.