Owls of the Raptor, birds of prey sanctuary Lincolnshire.

Whilst at one of the summer shows I came across this wonderful display of Owls.

The Raptor Foundation that was displaying the birds is a rescue and rehabilitation centre for raptors that are unable to be returned to the wild for various reasons.

The British Barn Owl (Tyto alba). The scientific name derives from the Greek word tuto meaning 'night-owl' and the Latin for 'white', so it literally translates as the 'White night Owl'.

The Indian Eagle Owl (Bubo bengalensis). It is found naturally across the Indian sub-Continent and as far north as the Himalayas.

Eurasion Eagle Owl (Bubo bubo). The largest of all owls it can be found  found throughout Europe, Scandinavia, Russia, the Middle East & Asia, with some being found breeding as far south as the Sahara in Africa.

These are magnificent creatures I am sure you will agree.

I hope I have named these birds correctly but I am sure if I haven't an 'eagle eyed' reader will correct me.

Check out more fabulous critters by clicking on the above image link.

Water Drops get a makeover!

I posted some water droplet pictures a couple of days ago that I had photographed in the kitchen sink.

Since taking them I have been playing a little with them in photoshop.

I've added a bit of colour,

and removed it.

 I even removed the background.

Hang on don't go...

I even take some drips out for a spin....

Water is fun, and so is playing with pictures of it in Photoshop. 

Remember to drip sorry drop by tomorrow for more fun with photos.

The beauty of wood.

As regular readers of my blog are aware I love to carve wood.

Wood has a magical quality to it. The texture, look and shape is different in every piece you find.

So, when I found this large round with its amazing textures and shapes I just had to get my camera and shoot off a few photos.

When you look at a piece of wood like this you wonder just what stories it could tell.

How did it form this way?

Also what can it be used for? At the moment it is decoration in the garden, but who knows what the future holds for it. 

My wife describes me as the techi and she the tree hugger but I'm sure even techi's are allowed to enjoy wood too.

Nature is such a wonderful thing that you just have to love it.

Water Droplets.

I was browsing through the internet just looking at other peoples blogs (lots of good ones out there, (check my blog roll for a few suggestions) when I came across some pictures of water droplets. This set me thinking how can I, capture them. 

So with a lot of trial and error I set up a shallow bowl in the kitchen sink, set my camera on a tripod just above the height of the rim of the dish and started shooting pictures as the tap dripped into the full dish.

I found I needed a flash gun off to one side and I also used a torch the other side so that the droplets were evenly lit as in the diagram above.

I set the aperture to f4.5 to allow lots of light in and a shutter speed of 1/200 sec to freeze the droplets.

I had to manually focus on the water as my camera wouldn't focus lock on the surface of the water. In hindsight I should have held a pen or something over the point where the drips fell and focused on that. Will have to remember that for next time.

The way the water bounces back up after the drip hits the water made for very interesting shapes.

The water almost looks like blown glass. For some of the shots I added a coloured reflector behind the bowl to give an extra colour cast to the pictures.

I hope you like these pictures and if you do how about trying to take some yourself, I'd be interested to hear how they came out. If anyone can suggest a different way to do this let me know either by the comments or contact me sections. I'm always looking for new ways to take pictures.

All the fun of the Fair.

A little while ago I bought you some of the photo's I took at the RAF Waddington Airshow.

I took my youngest daughter with me for the day and just to prove I didn't make her just sit and watch planes all day, here are some photos from the funfair.

We got there early so as you can see there were not many people at the stalls yet.

Harriet chose to go on the waltzers first. Trying to get a good photo whilst the waltzer whizzes by at great speed is great fun in itself. The colours really stand out and the blur shows the speed of the waltzer as it flashed past. 

 

We went back over to the fair later on in the day after the main air displays.

Its good to see smiling faces on the rides.

Chickens - Camera Critters.

One of the joys of moving to the countryside a few years ago, was the ability to keep chickens.

We only have a small flock of eight at the moment but its nice to watch them roam the garden and there eggs are great too!

Today's post is also a Camera Critters post.

We hatched this girl about three years ago. She's a Welsummer breed.  

Heads down there's corn in that grass girls! 

One of our newest additions Her and her four friends are Bovan Browns and are point of lays. Come on girls lets have some eggs please!

This is the only one of our original flock still with us. She is also the only one with a name, 'Trouble'. Trouble by name trouble by nature. She never goes where you want her to. Is always the last in the run at night and often gives the kids a merry chase around the garden when they try to round her up.

It's nice to sit and watch the chickens just roaming about in the garden.

If that has got you interested then check out some other animal antics over at Camera Critters Blog just click on the Camera Critters logo.

Ruby Red Macro - The Brenda Photo Challenge.

As part of the Brenda Photo Challenge I bring to you today

 Ruby Red Macro.

When thinking about what I could bring to you under the guise of Ruby Red Macro my first thought was of a red flower. Typically no red flowers where in bloom in our garden, so, looking around the house I came across this little green frog, holding a ruby red flower.

I thought at first I would just bring you the one photograph today but whilst sat at my computer thinking about this post I glanced in my mug of tea sat next to me and realised that the inside of the mug is ruby red. 

So grabbing my camera again I bring you a Ruby Red mug of tea. I think the bubbles that had formed along the edge of the tea lend that little extra panache to the photo.

Check out the other entrants to Brenda's Photo Challenge at:

 http://brendaphotochallenge.blogspot.com/

Lincolnshire Project 23rd July 2010.

I'm returning today to my Lincolnshire Project where I have set out to photograph the same scene in Lincolnshire every two weeks throughout the year.

The tree on the left I had hoped to portray as getting greener as the seasons progressed. Unfortunately it has died and therefore grown no leaves this year.

The rest of the hedgerow and trees have a profusion of leaves of different hues but the tree on the end has unfortunately grown no leaves this year. This does spoil the effect of the series of photos, but then, it is a real rendition of nature as it grows, or doesn't in this case.

For those of you wondering where Lincolnshire is, it is a county on the east coast of England, highlighted on the map below.

Lincolnshire is a beautiful county. The south of the county where we live, is very flat. Most of the south of the county is land that was reclaimed from the sea many years ago. This means that the soil is very rich and fertile and therefore ideal for agricultural farming as you can see from the project pictures. This can mean that the fields differ in hue depending on the crop planted.

 Lincolnshire can be a very colourful place to live, follow this project with me and we will see just what colours develop in this particular view of Lincolnshire.

Schools Out, for ever!

Yesterday was our youngest daughters last day at primary school.

It was the end of an era. All 3 of our girls have gone through that same primary school in rural Lincolnshire.

Now Harriet is the last one to leave.

She went out in style though as she won the Miss Atkinson award for excellence in academic and all round achievement throughout this last school year.

The day was rounded off by a game of rounders (excuse the pun!)

It was staff versus the year six pupils.

Even the Head of school joined in.

There did seem to be more missing of the ball than hitting it though.

Some of the boys broke the trend though and hit it right across the field getting a full rounder in the process.

The final score was unfortunately a win for the staff ( only the second time they have won in the last 7 years).

It's been a good school and all three of our girls have done well there.

But now it's time to say, bye, bye school and on to the next chapter, of secondary school.

Well done Harriet!