I did only plan on walking halfway around but as there are so many benches and it was such a lovely day I decided to carry on and do the full lake. Was I glad I had. As we got near enough to the halfway mark we saw this Coot messing about on the edge of the lake:
You can just about see him bottom centre
He was working so hard trying to find bits of dried grasses and things (I missed the best photo by not having the camera ready)
Here he is with a bit of dried grass in his beak
(you'll have to take my word for it)
His Missus patiently waiting on the nest they were building
and him delivering it to her
It was fascinating to watch him, no sooner had he made sure she was ok with what he had brought her than he was off again across the corner of the lake to find something else. The first time we noticed him he had quite a large piece in his beak, the second time only a bit so for the third trip we witnessed he went off in the opposite direction. Obviously to find a richer bit of banking. It was fascinating to watch Nature at work in this way - just wish we had a better camera. Sorry about the quality.
Forgot to say that when we arrived (this is on the opposite side - we are now halfway around) the grass was littered with feathers (moulting I presume) and "poo" and the number of Swans, Canadian Geese etc was enormous. At this point it was pretty much the same.
This is another lake (there are four I think -
plus the river)
On the small one at the far side (almost back to where we started from) there were some water lilies but I could not get close enough to take a photo so you will have to make do with these, which are nowhere near as pretty as the normal pink big ones. Those that had finished flowering had insides very much like the seed heads of poppies. Whilst I was taking this last photo we heard a "plop" and a tiny fish landed on one of the lily pads and began wiggling about until he finally got back into the water. He was only a tiddler but the men were fishing for bream, trout, tench and pike. Wonder how many were caught that day?
Right, I will leave you with a card, so you don't feel cheated with no crafting on, so here is one I made just before I went in hospital. I just love these two!
I think the stamp is from Lost Coast and it was stamped over a Distress background. I then stamped some crackle over two pieces of Mica and affixed them with those brads. I remember the other day noticing the top brad was not holding the Mica in place so a tiny bit of Glossy Accents did the trick. It's my Cracked Couple!
