A small section of the winter gull roost on Hurleston Reservoir near Nantwich in southern Cheshire, England.
Mostly Black-headed Gulls with a few Lesser Black-backed Gulls and a couple of Common Gulls. Anything less than 10,000 Black-headed Gulls was a small roost.
This is my day 27 contribution to Becky’s October Squares challenge on the theme of Kind.
This is my contribution to the Lens-Artists Photo Challenge set by Ann-Christine who asked us to Pick a Word from a list in her post.
I went with two of the words for my post, Crowded and Tangled.
When I read the prompt for Cee’s Black and White Photo Challenge: Birds I considered giving this challenge a miss.
Having had bird photos published everywhere from field guides to calendars over the years there has been a few times when I was embarrassed having my name on the photo credit. Each time was when an editor/publisher converted a colour original into monochrome.
Then I thought about going with a small selection of black and/or white birds. Meaning mostly black and/or white plumage.
Snow Geese on autumn migration in Saskatchewan, Canada.
A Turkey Vulture making sure that the photographer is alive as it glides along the Lake Huron shoreline in Southampton, Ontario, Canada.
A section of a winter Gull roost takes flight over Hurleston Reservoir near Nantwich, Cheshire, England.
When I read the prompt for the Tuesday Photo Challenge – Scale I had several ideas for a post.
Landscapes taken with a telephoto where it’s difficult to get a sense of scale, extreme close-ups where you can’t tell what you’re looking at.
So, typically for me recently, I went in a completely different direction after thinking of a particular photo.
This is the photo I thought of, a Great Crested Grebe looking lost amongst gulls in a winter roost on Hurleston Reservoir near Nantwich, Cheshire. These are mostly Black-headed Gulls, there’s one Common Gull close to the edge of the frame at about 1 o’clock.
This may explain why the Great Crested Grebe is looking lost. A section of a winter gull roost on Hurleston Reservoir. Again, mostly Black-headed Gulls with a few Common Gulls, one Lesser Black-backed Gull and one Herring Gull.
If the second photo didn’t give a sense of scale to the Great Crested Grebe looking lost this one may. This is most of a fairly typical winter gull roost in the 1990s. Anywhere between 12,000 and 15,000 gulls was a normal count. If you look closely there’s a Great Crested Grebe just swimming into the frame on the left hand side of the photo.
This is my contribution to the Weekly Prompts Photo Challenge: The Tree.
Having decided to ignore the obvious theme, the Christmas tree, I had a couple of ideas for the challenge before remembering the remains of a tree in a reservoir in south Cheshire.
It only became visible when the water level dropped but when it appeared it was popular with the birds.
A pair of Mallard hanging out on the remains.
A Common Coot standing on it.
A Canada Goose doing Tai Chi on it.
A juvenile Grey Heron on it. The bird is watching something closely.
Some winter plumage Black-headed Gulls on and around it.
This is my contribution to Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge: 1 Item or the Number One.
One shot immediately came to mind and I decided not to over think the challenge and to go with that photo.
A solitary Great Crested Grebe in a Black-headed Gull roost.
My contribution to the Weekly Prompts Photo Challenge: White.
Now I will admit that my first thought was snow but after a winter that dragged on for what seemed like 6 months I didn’t want to think about snow.
So I decided to go with a selection of photos of bird species that are mostly white, the first two have white in their common English name.
White-breasted Nuthatch, Saskatchewan, Canada.
American White Pelican, Last Mountain Lake National Wildlife Area, Saskatchewan, Canada.
Caspian Tern with fish on the Lake Huron shoreline in Southampton, Ontario, Canada.
Black-headed Gulls in winter, Cheshire, England.
Snow Geese on autumn migration, Last Mountain Lake National Wildlife Area, Saskatchewan, Canada.
Whooper Swan portrait, Lancashire, England.
