Stark beauty

There is such a stark beauty about Winter, especially on a clear cloudless day. Trees now shorn of their Summer foliage and beginning their slumber until the next Spring. Its glorious, if only it wasn't quite so cold...

Wild flowers

Some wild flowers (or weeds if you like) i encountered this lunch time.

Autumn is coming

After a late burst of Summer Autumn seems to be firmly with us now, here is a scene from 2012.

Wild flowers

Wild flowers (or weeds depending on your point of view) growing near the Birmingham Business Park.

Plantsbrook tree

One of the photos from my recent visits to Plantsbrook Nature Reserve.

Plantsbrook Local Nature Reserve

Plantsbrook is a local nature reserve that i really should go to more often seeing as it is only a couple of miles away from where i live, still i made my (first or only) visit in 2014 this morning. Plantsbrook is especially lovely on a sunny morning. You can see some photos i took here.

Whitehouse Common

A flower close-up on Whitehouse Common in Sutton Coldfield.

Curdworth fields post harvest

Back in early June i had a walk along public footpaths through some farm fields near Curdworth, back then the crops were high and looking fairly healthy despite the dry weather. I returned today to a barren post-harvest landscape. I like the bleakness of it all to be honest. You can see the photos i took here or in the slideshow below of course.

Spring along the canal

Spring as is the season of course not metal spirals or leaping. With the blossom out and Mother Nature sprouting after the hard Winter it is looking really beautiful and lush along the canal near where i work so i thought i would take the office digital SLR out at lunchtime and take some photos. As its a much better camera than my own the photos look pretty good too.

One photo i am very proud of though is this one of a duck taking off. I'd never be able to take that with my cheapo digital camera. Maybe i should buy a DSLR then. Anyway the full Flickr set is here. Meanwhile you can amazingly see Cliff Richard drive a speed boat down the Tame Valley Canal in this movie clip!

Staycation

I have today and tomorrow off work, i'm not going anywhere hence "staycation"! I have been fairly busy today though, i've managed to do some DIY and visited the local nature reserve Plantbrook for the first time this year. Of course at the latter i took some photographs.

The DIY was all in the bathroom, i bought a new shower head as the old one seemed to be falling apart and spraying water everywhere. Fitting that was easy, even me with my mediocre DIY skill set could do that. The other task was to replace the toilet seat with one my wife bought which intriguingly looks exactly the same as the old one. That job had to be delayed though as i lacked the right screwdriver. There is always tomorrow.

I also put in some carrot seeds and built a second nursery cage. The radish in the first one are yet to sprout but its the seeding time now so i can't really wait.