The latest daubing is of an English river bed, complete with Pike, Roach, Minnows and stylised scribbles. Destined for a family member who likes to sit on a river bank in the company of a rod and line.
Thanks Skev, although I would argue that you do have the patience, as demonstrated by your ability to collect and then stare down a microscope at a beetles nether regions.
Very subtle Steve. I like the Pike that is turning and the hint of unknown fish/creatures to the left. The top is intriguing-I mean the mixture of white giving the impression of looking at the sky from beneath or the sea from above as if it were spume.The blackened fish are interesting.Theres a lot going on in the painting. I was interested in the comment that the picture framer said that the person doing this was a designer not an artist. Seems to me thats a bit snobbish. Think maybe he or she should look at wikipediae and definition of art. Strong element of design indeed but very beautiful.
We have three medium-sized Lavender bushes in our back garden. Throughout the summer the flowers (which last for several months) are a magnet for insects and give off a most restful aroma. As tempting as it is to cut the dead stems in the autumn, we always leave them, as we know that during the late winter we will get visitors to feed on the seed heads... This video was taken from the kitchen window this morning. We will normally see one or two birds over a few days, but have had up to 14 at once. We never tire of watching them. Lavender is a wonderful plant to have in the garden, with year round natural history benefits. So what are you waiting for? They are readily available at a garden centre close to you right now! There is an historic association with Lavender in this part of northern Surrey and south London. Lavender fields have been harvested for many years, with one particular field close to Woodmansterne being very popular with day trippers. A significant proportion o...
In birding, timing can mean the difference between an average day in the field and that of a spectacular one. Good timing can be helped by reading the weather conditions correctly, or understanding local conditions but it is more often down to pure luck. In this case, I just got lucky... I had not visited Dungeness since March 2022, quite a gap for me. It was high time that I once more trod the shingle and my timing of a visit was down to several factors, mostly a personal liking for mid-late autumn but also because I needed to be at home until September 20th and could not make the journey south until then. I also chose to stay at the bird observatory for a few days rather than make it a day trip. All this conveniently found me stepping outside the observatory's back door in the breaking dawn of Sunday 22nd September, quickly making my way to the fishing boats, an area I prefer to stand to best appreciate any visible bird migration, an aspect of birding that I find exhilarating. A...
I was involved in a three-way Twitter conversation this afternoon that was really quite interesting. It was between 'local' birders, with one member of the triumvirate voicing concern that the local birding scene is slowly withering on the vine. Let's look at the facts. It was suggested that there are 50 -60 keen birders who live within the immediate catchment area of Beddington Sewage Farm, Canons Farm and Holmethorpe Sand Pits. Of these, only a handful are what could be termed 'regulars' at one of these patches. In fact, the numbers of avid patch watchers at all three sites is dwindling. This doesn't concern me as much as it did one of this afternoon's tweeters. Let's take each patch on its own, with Beddington first up. This is a site that has been covered by birdwatchers for close on a century. It has an unbroken and thorough ornithological record since the 1930s. But within this time there have been peaks and troughs of effort. The 1950s and 196...
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I was interested in the comment that the picture framer said that the person doing this was a designer not an artist. Seems to me thats a bit snobbish. Think maybe he or she should look at wikipediae and definition of art. Strong element of design indeed but very beautiful.