Birds around Kidderminster, 15th February 2016

Today, 15th February 2016 was very cold and clear with very strong winter sunshine.

I took Poppy out for a walk and because of the good light, took my SX60 out to see if I could get any chance hand held shots of birds.

The strong light is both a blessing and a curse. On the one hand it means fast shutter speeds, on the other, high contrast shots, and whites blown out.

Below are the best results obtained. Not rare birds, but hopefully some pleasant pictures.

Unfortunately, viewing them on screen, they seem to have come out much softer than the originals.

Two Canada Geese and a Coot. Strong light means the whites are blown out on these otherwise dark birds.

Mistle Thrush

A couple of Starlings

Woodpigeon – full zoom against the sky means some pretty strong colour fringing

The only cat allowed on my blog

Just looked outside at my little car. I had a call from Head Office today to say my new one was ready for delivery. It got me reminiscing about all the trips I’d made in the XF since April 13 when I had it. It’s done 127,000 miles, so there have been a lot.

I’ve had 18 UK ticks since I had it, the first being the Kent Dusky Thrush, the most recent the Orkney Chestnut Bunting.

I’ve dipped Hawk Owl three times in it – twice I drove to the eastern end of Holland and watched from the car pointlessly. So it is with great satisfaction that the last new bird I’ve seen, before it goes away forever, was a stunning Hawk Owl in Sweden last month.

Karma.