Category: David

Red horse chestnut flowers, from a tree growing by Birmingham New Road.

Same birds as in the previous post, but now seen from a direction looking towards the sunlit side of their plumage.

Heron by the side of the West Park lake, on the lookout for prey early one morning. Close by it a couple of mallards concentrate on taking care of their feathers.

Reds and greens of waterlily leaves, with a background of reflected sky on the surface of the Fowler’s Park pond.

As I went around West Park’s boating lake early one morning recently, this year’s six cygnets and the mother swan started swimming towards me then climbed onto the shore for a closer view.

Every other time I’ve seen them, before and after this occasion, they have been sensibly wary of people. On that morning, the pen was alert, but did not seem unduly worried.

Bumble bee clinging to a grass flower in the early morning, having used the spot to stay overnight.

The spike, or officially the Casual Ward, was the, unusally extremely unpleasant, short-term accommodation. Vagrants with no other options could get, usually, a single night in a squalid communal room and an unappetising meal in exchange for a set amount of soul-destroying work such as breaking rocks or picking oakum.