All along the backwater,
Through the rushes tall,
Ducks are a-dabbling,
Up tails all!
As long as I can remember I’ve known this poem (there is more and if you settle down I will be quoting all of it!), taken from Chapter 2 of Wind In The Willows by Kenneth Grahame. As well as being a great story, it has strong sentimental ties, as it was my Mother’s favourite book.
Today’s image was taken on a lunch time stroll along the edge of the Thames, with the gentle spring sun warming me as I walked. There are several large ponds, on which to my surprise I spotted a male and female Gadwall (not picture here but there is a picture of the male on Flickr for today) and then, having heard the call first, I soon spotted my first Chiffchaff of the year (call identification thanks to the excellent CD recently blogged about).
The customary bag of sunflower seeds were put to great use, attracting a number of birds closer to me; when distributing the seed I ensure I scattered them far enough to account for the 5.5m minimum focal length of the 600mm lens. I think I did rather a good job looking at today’s images.
Hopefully the weather will keep like this all week and into the weekend to help build up a surplus of images to upload. On a side note, Having had my camera just over a year now (a year and a few days) I have just clicked over the 20,000 mark on it. I wonder how many I’m going to take this year? Any bets?
Andrew Skelton: 
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