Mobile phone camera’s are getting better all the time and have the great advantage of being in peoples pockets so capture the moment is possible da iawn.
today.
pioden y môr - oystercatcher. Not the best image but a ring can be clearly seen on it’s leg.
and
Cenhinen bedr - daffodils.
Cheers J.P.
Gwylan ar y bont dros Llyn Merced
Gull on the bridge over Lake Merced
Speaking of capture the moment, I managed to get this lovely shot on my run earlier! I think it’s an adult breeding Western Gull (Larus occidentalis), but possibly an American Herring Gull (Larus smithsonianus) or some hybrid thereof (hybridisation is common here).
Nice image and the gull would look like a herring gull here. Your comment about gulls hybridising reminds me that gull hybridisation around the northern hemisphere is a good example to start a talk on ‘the problem with species’.
Yesterday i escaped to the coast for a day to see what is about, my knowledge of coastal birds is thin, the conditions were not the best for photographs but soon the migration north will start so i took the opportunity.
Corhwyaden (gwrywaidd a benywaidd) - Teal (male and female).
Hwyaden yr eithin - Shell duck.
Cheers J.P.
Hwyaden lostfain (gwrywaidd a benywaidd) - Pintail (male and female).
Cheers J.P.
Gwydd wyllt - Greylag goose.
Siglen fraith - Pied wagtail.
Update on mystery material, neu Star jelly of which i posted an image in November.
It now seems a scientist at the natural history museum using DNA technology has solved the mystery.
The material is described as a glycoprotein and it’s source is a frog (female). It seems the frog coats its eggs with this material as they are laid and the glycoprotein swells in water providing a protective coat for the egg/eggs, so it appears a predator has devoured piecemeal a frog where the jelly was found, the predator rejected the glycoprotein (perhaps sensing it would feel ill if this material swelled in it’s crop/stomach) and the material then swelled by absorbing environmental moisture.
Cheers J.P.
Ffesant - pheasant, looks like he just noticed the camera.
Draenen ddu - Blackthorn , plenty of coulor in some hedgrows.
Close up, all that beauty will not last long.
Cheers J.P.
Just think - in a few months they’ll be sloes and a couple of months after that they can be sloe gin - mmmmm 
I wonder if ‘our’ heron does this, as he/she seems to live on a diet of amphibians and must have eaten a lot of females in just such a condition!! I don’t think we’ve noticed any ‘star jelly’, but since it snowed and rained, I guess it would have disappeared by now.
…and either he’s not too impressed, or perhaps he’s putting on his best formal face for the camera, like our great-grandparents used to do.
Now that sounds like a man with a plan (cherry blossom is starting as well).
[quote=“henddraig, post:248, topic:971”]
I wonder if ‘our’ heron does this, as he/she seems to live on a diet of amphibians and must have eaten a lot of females in just such a condition!! I don’t think we’ve noticed any ‘star jelly’, but since it snowed and rained, I guess it would have disappeared by now.
[/quote].
That’s a good point, from what i have seen, herons swallow pretty much anything whole so may not produce the effect, hence star jelly being relatively rare. The cause suggested by scientist is when something like a member of the crow family predate a frog, they peck it piecemeal and leave the glycoprotein behind. i believe some animals that take toads for food, go through their underbelly and turn them inside out leaving the warty skin behind.
It’s proving something for me to think about, how critters react to the lense which maybe to them looks like a big eye, I’m finding that as i turn the lense towards blue tits they leave (hence no decent image of blue tit so far) yet some other birds seem not to notice.
OK folks, Friday approaches with the promised solar eclipse, at the moment the weather forecast looks uncertain it will be viewable here, so camera’s at the ready and i hope someone gets a nice image.
Pidyn y gog - Lords and ladies.
Close up on single leaf of what is a member of the ‘Arum’ family with many colloquial names in English including cuckoo’s point (slightly different to the direct Welsh translation).
This looks a fairly bland bunch of green leaves in March (often with purple to black spots), but is a really interesting plant because of it’s physical transformation through the seasons. (hint, pretty photo’s possible later).
Cheers J.P.
Cuckoo Pint when I was a lad.
That’s what I call it!!
So how come the herons don’t get problems with their stomachs? Some sort of special digestion system???
Do you think the purple / black spots have any special function John?
From a distance it appears as though the leaves have some kind of disease or something,but in the closeup it looks more like a natural part of the leaf.
Cuckoo’s point, cuckoo pint, well somebody misheard that somewhere and is just one example of language development/diversion.
That’s a good question for which i don’t have an answer, the suggestion about crow family, is just a suggestion, the truth maybe coincidental due to texture of glycoprotein when the frog is pecked apart, or taste or something not thought of yet, i think my observation of the Heron swallowing prey whole is correct and of course they have a much larger crop. This is one of many joys going outside (always new questions to mull over).
I don’t know of any special function but am sure there are many possible answers.
This plant is rather interesting in many ways, apparently it is one of several that have developed the ability to smell like rotten meat to attract flies when it is flowering, ie the flies visit and leave with pollen stuck on them and hopefully visit another arum and so fertilize that with the pollen.
Apparently some observant people have noted that the flower also rises well above environment temperature, (i wonder why, maybe the higher temperature makes the chemical smell more volatile increasing effect).
Also this plant (like many others) suffers with a fairly specific rust fungus which i have not photographed (must get out more).
I do recall there has been quite a bit of scientific work done on understanding plants that grow in shade versus open space, how they cope with changing light levels, and the different ways of using light energy to harvest carbon from CO2, so its just a thought on the appearance of purple/black spots may in some way relate to this, maybe those in shade develop more spots.
There is a project for a group of students some time, thanks for the interesting input pawb.
Cheers J.P.
Well, to start with today i was really lucky, i knew that my camera would not cope with a clear blue sky eclipse without filters i don’t have.
The day started complete cloud cover which meant nothing to see of the sunrise (except cloud), so how lucky could i be, well at the start of the eclipse (Oxford) while working and keeping an eye on the sky, the cloud thinned enough for some images without getting to bright and swamping the sensor.
So as the eclipse progressed i tried an image from the back garden between chimneys and if i had realised how the contrast would work i would have taken all images from there.
Anyway from the front i got more images of eclipse progress.
To what was maximum cover for the location.
No doubt there will be some really good images on the net, but i’m happy to have seen it as i believe there won’t be another in my life time.
Cheers J.P.
Da iawn John!
Y Cefnfor Tawel
The Pacific Ocean
It was beautiful out today, so a friend and I took her dog for a romp at the beach. 
I was delighted to see peewits/lapwings cavorting over Cors Caron today.
I seem to have missed them for the last year or so
Them lapwings were so common 40 years ago on the farm, now we have to look for a few.
roedd hi fel y diwrnod cyntaf y gwanwyn.
llawer o heulwen a fi yn gweld y glöyn byw cyntaf.
Yes: it was like the first day of spring.
Lots of sunshine and i saw my first butterfly of the year.
Melyn y rhafnwydd - Brimstone.
Siglen lwyd - Grey wagtail.
First slow worm (bad photo) will try again.
Cheers J.P.