First Snow

It really should have been a landscape day.  I've got plenty of images of snow covered scenes, both from Cannock Chase and Weston Park, but what happened in the last hour of photography convinced me to post this image.

Firstly, this robin demanded my attention by perching right in front of me as I was composing a shot.  Not only that but he dropped onto the ground and came right up to my feet.  he didn't even fly off when I went down on my haunches and stretched out my hand towards him.  I'm sure if I'd had some seed, he would have popped on my hand.  It required lifting the camera off the tripod and ramping up the iso and opening up the aperture; at which point it perched on the tripod head!  It was ridiculous, he was so close I couldn't focus on him.  Of course as I moved back he flew onto another perch!  We had a great 15-20 minutes of cat and mouse, trying to get a good shot of him.

Then, as I was leaving I bumped into Martin, the Head Gardener on the estate.  He said there was a kestrel in front of the house, looking a little worse for wear (see extra).  I reckon this might be a young bird, possibly struggling with the conditions.  Martin, was able to pick it up with little difficulty and was going to keep it safe.

So, given the influence of our feathered friends towards the end of the day, I decided to share this image, rather than a typical landscape.