AUTUMN…THANK F**K IT’S NOT ALL RED AND GOLD.

 

A couple of hundred yards from SHPics winter base, this small flood pool sits smack in the middle of a very marshy field  alongside the river Cherwell. Maybe two weeks ago, I bumped into a chap exercising his two gun dogs who saw my confused look and informed me that ducks like nothing more than a bale of hay…..I’m only guessing, but I reckon there’s a distinct chance that this is bait, not just  ‘feeding the duckie-wuckies big-style’ .

Since then, though I’ve walked through here on maybe a dozen occasions, I’ve yet to see anything with webbed feet….Ah well, I’ll just have to stick to chicken portions, (though I’m wearing camouflage pants and carrying a dirty great stick with a nail through the end just in case)…..

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It currently seems virtually impossible to find time to take any photographs, let alone post them, and I admit I’m getting a little cheesed off. I’m surrounded by some absolutely beautiful countryside but in the early mornings and late afternoons (when of course the light is best), I’m always really busy. If I get out during the middle of day, I just get frustrated when I remember how good the light had been earlier when I’d sneaked a peek through the window. Its a bummer!

Anyway, I took these shots late afternoon on thursday,(hurrah), when as luck would have it, I finished what I was doing at exactly the same time as the rain stopped, and I had fifty whole minutes before I needed to jump in the Jeep and head off to an assignation with a glamorous woman …(who incidentally shares my surname). It was only fifty minutes but it really did me the power of good…...

I suppose the only upside of having my snapping exploits curtailed, is that I don’t feel any compunction to shoot thousands and thousands of  autumnal leafy shots. Pick up a magazine or newspaper from mid September to mid November and every single one is ramm-jammed full of red and gold leaves….Jeeeeeeesus! Editors of the world….Give it a rest!

The shots above are of the Cherwell itself…You can shove your red and gold leaves where the sun doesn’t shine…Nice and chilly and blue…..I can’t wait to see this with some ice and snow in the mix…and, even though I admit it is a teensy weensy  bit goldified, the final shot is happily leaf-free…So no apologies!

All Images Copyright Stuart Allan Hyde…