So far so good.  I’ve managed to turn out something like a half decent photograph each day throughout January, which was my initial intention.  And today I wanted catkins.

This afternoon whilst hunting for these elusive catkins I stopped at a place where I had spotted sloes in the hedgerows last autumn.  There are very few wild hedgerows still allowed to stand hereabouts; the farmers butcher them as soon as the summer crops are gathered in, which means that even if there is wild hazel present in the hedges, the catkins don’t stand a chance come January and February.  So I headed to this same lane with uncut hedges hoping for catkins and found none.

Instead I shot waddling ducks and geese.  And clucking hens.

I inadvertently revisited a time long ago when I used to create cross stitch pictures.  I remember sitting by the fire in the evening toasting my toes and stitching pictures in little crosses. These were then framed and hung on the wall.  One of the pictures I created in embroidery silks back then was of ducks and geese waddling across a farmyard.

The image in front of me and my camera today was very similar – a lovely smallholding with chickens, ducks and geese wandering freely in a little orchard. There were still a few patches of snow on the ground from Saturday’s short sharp blizzards.  At the end of the orchard there was a large hen house which appeared to be home to all of these birds; the entire contingent headed for the open door alarmed when I clicked my camera at them.  They honked and clucked and quacked collectively.  As well they  might.