Around The Garden

10-05-22

The Humble Dandelion

I’ve been trying to tidy up the garden a bit, but as usual keep getting distracted by the flowers and cats.

New Growth

Herb Robert

Lilacs

The Lilacs are just going over, I love the colour they add to the garden.

Thursday Doors

05-05-22

Thornby Hall

I was going to post this for last weeks “Thursday Doors” over at Dan Antions excellent blog, but chores and other mundane things got in the way. After my adrenaline ride on the back of my buddies Triumph motorbike to Thornby Hall I managed to steady my hands enough to take some images.

View of the Hall

According to their website the site of the Hall dates back to the 1500’s. The building of the present hall starting in 1665. The site is now a meditation centre and as you would expect very calming, I think the lovely warm colour of the stone helps convey calmness.

Detail of the door and entrance above

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A simple side door

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The gardens around the hall are really worth a walk around, not too manicured, left to be more natural.

There was even a Redwood tree

I know it’s not a door, but I liked this little shelter/gazebo

Looking forward to going back for another visit, they serve really good food and coffee, not to mention homemade cakes !

Missed It

29-04-22

Missed posting on “Thursday doors” yesterday, was out in town for the best part and had chores to do and my cat Mimi to fuss when I got back to home. Whilst hanging out the washing this morning (the excitement never ends) I noticed the garden had sprung into life a bit, also noticed how much work I need to do to get it into some sort of shape. The weather in my part of the UK has been very mixed, it’s still quite cold and windy. The only camera I had with a charged battery was my old Olympus E400, but I managed to get a few shots of the spring growth.

Quite a lot of Bluebells this year

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The Rhododendron is covered in flowers

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Even one or two Cornflowers were out

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The Lilacs look and smell lovely

Gardening & Eyebrows

25-08-19

Gardening

It’s been unseasonably hot the last couple of days, 26 deg C / 78 deg, it feels much warmer. I thought it was about time I tackled some of the pruning that I have been putting off for far too long. With the strange weather we have had this year the garden has in parts gone into overdrive. To relieve the boredom I took a few quick photo’s with my old Olympus E400 and Zuiko 35mm macro lens.

Hips

Lavender

The Lavender has really gone berserk this year, good for the Bee’s though.

Bud

Still some buds on the Roses.

Blackberries

They are trying their best to take over the garden this year.

Liked By The Bees

Eyebrows

The visiting cat is getting a bit cheeky. At 4 am on Saturday morning I felt a gentle nuzzling on my eyebrow, it was the Black & White lad wanting some breakfast. He comes in everyday now and occasionally has a sleep over! my two cats fortunately are quite tolerant of him most of the time. During the day on Saturday I was working on the front garden, I went in to make myself a cup of coffee and as I looked back to the open front door there was a mother cat and two tiny kittens. The mother cat (long haired very dark Tortoiseshell) has been sneaking in and clearing all the cat food dishes (she’s very wary), I leave a bit of extra food down for her as I’m sure that feeding two little ones she needs it.

Rolling out the Rollei

25-06-18

I’ve had my slightly battered Rolleiflex 3.5F since the late 1980’s, the slow shutter speeds eventually started sticking so took it in to be CLA’d in 2008, and have never used it since. Thought it was about time to give it a test run. Found a roll of Ilford Delta 400 (expired 2006) and quickly shot some images with it around the garden on Friday. Developed it Friday evening in some Adox FX39, (just enough in the bottle) and let it dry overnight.

The images aren’t anything special, just wanted to know if everything was working as it should.

Lavender 

With Rolleinar II closeup lens.

It was extremely bright and sunny on Friday (still is) so the lighting was really harsh.

Blackberry Flowers

With Rolleinar II closeup lens in a dark part of the garden.

Berries

With Rolleinar II closeup lens in a dark part of the garden.

Rose

With Rolleinar II closeup lens in a dark part of the garden.

Fleur (Do Not Disturb)

Every time I moved in close to take a photo she decided to move !

Me & My Shadow with some Timber

Everything seems to be working fine with the camera, and considering how out of date the film was I’m quite pleased with the results. Out with the PhotoBuddies on Thursday so I might take it along with some fresh film.

In The Garden

29-05-18

The cats were out in the garden this morning practising their stalking skills on each other. Of course as soon as I went out with a camera they stopped and followed me around, I’m sure it was just in case I might have had some cat treats with me.

Fleur

Mimi (Fleurs Daughter)

They were both full of energy this morning, and brought a smile to my face with their playfulness.

The weather has been a bit unsettled over the last few days, but at least we haven’t had any of the severe storms like some other parts of the UK, Yet. The garden is very green at the moment, and lots of the plants are late in flowering. It was windy today making it a bit difficult to photograph the flowers that were out.

Rose

Sage

The Bee’s were enjoying this.

New Pine

Wild Rose

 

Nikon FM2

04-06-17

One of my Beer & Curry night buddies very kindly donated his old Nikon FM2 to me. It’s very well used and he wasn’t sure if everything still worked as it should.

It came with 3 Nikon lenses, a 50mm f1.8, 28mm f2.8, and a 70-210mm f4.

So I popped in some fresh batteries and loaded up with £1.00 a roll Agfa Vista 200.

Frame 0

Didn’t expect this to come out as I was winding on to frame No.1. Nice shot of my Giottos blower though !

In The Garden – 50mm Lens

Mimi

Mimi is difficult to photograph because of the amount of white fur she has, and she’s very lively, but I’m guessing a bird or something must of caught her attention giving me time to grab this shot. Film tends to cope with the whites better than my digital camera’s.

70 – 210mm Lens

Lilac Tree

An exciting shot of my washing! But a good subject for testing the focus and Bokeh on the lens.

Street Art – 28mm Lens

The film was processed at a quick photo store which means lots of scratches and marks. Had to use Digital ICE on the Coolscan to remove it, this softens the image so a little bit of sharpening in post processing was needed.

Really liked the Nikon, good viewfinder and a wide range of shutter speeds so it’s really flexible.

In The Garden

Well it’s taken me a long time to shake off my man flu but I felt much better yesterday, the weather helped, it was actually sunny and quite warm for a change. So a catch up on the garden chores were desperately needed.

I read a few weeks ago much to my disbelief and dismay that garden plants from many DIY stores and nurseries have been treated with insecticides that can be deadly to bees. I really don’t understand this, one of the reasons I buy plants is to attract wildlife, not kill it. But it makes money for big chemical corporations I guess !!!!!!!!!!!. The film “Idiocracy” comes to mind. The good news is one of the biggest DIY chains in the UK is no longer going to sell plants treated with insecticides, hopefully the others will follow their lead.

After the lawn was mowed and shrubs were pruned I took the camera into the garden to get a few images of some of the flowers, they have had a hard time this year with the cold and rain.

In The Garden Today

Thought I would spend the day pottering around the garden, having a slight hangover I thought the fresh air would do me good. It was a lovely sunny day but the wind was cold.

Reason For The Hangover!

 I really enjoy seeing this band they are called “The Moonlights”, and the venue had 2 beers I hadn’t tried before, well that’s my excuse.

Lavender Bud

Bluebells

Grape Hyacinth

Corn Flower

Rhododendron

Forget Me Not

Lavender

Clematis

Clematis

It’s a bugs life

I used my Olympus EPL1 with an old Helios 58mm lens and extension tube. It was quite tricky getting the shots because of the breezy conditions and really narrow depth of field. It’s lovely to see the signs of spring well underway in the garden, not so good to see the amount of work I need to do.

Fungi in my garden

23-10-16

Noticed some Fungi in the garden this morning, so grabbed the Olympus EPL1 and Helios 58mm – f2 lens. I think the fungi are growing along some old tree roots.