In the shadows of the verge by the lane grow the mysteriously fungi. Many of them I don’t know the names of, as unless they’re either brightly coloured, or very toxic, I tend not to pay their names very much attention. And so it is with this little shroom. Looking down on it (and a… Continue reading Flying Saucers
Category: Natural Wonders
Fly Agaric
Amanita Muscaria, aka the Fly Agaric, is probably my favourite fungi. To be fair it’s one of the only mushrooms I’m likely to have half a chance of spying by myself at a reasonable (to me anyway) distance – the bright red and white spotted caps do tend to stand out a bit. So when… Continue reading Fly Agaric
Speeding Cyclamen
This tiny pink cyclamen flower was hiding in the overgrown front garden. Our fully sighted PA and I had to saw down part of a goat willow tree this week, as it has gotten too big. My hands and shoulders still haven’t recovered. Sam spotted the tiny pink blur on the bank and pointed it… Continue reading Speeding Cyclamen
The Parasite’s Quilt
Tucked into the hedgerows, where the wild roses climb and curl, a strange thing grows in the warm early autumn sun. It looks like a sea urchin woven from fairy floss – pink and green, frizzed and fine, like something a woodland sprite might use as a hairbrush. But this isn’t a fruit, or a… Continue reading The Parasite’s Quilt
Hydrangea Posy
From The Plantation Garden in Norwich. A close-up portrait of a soft violet hydrangea bloom, cradled in darkness. The four petals of each flower are delicate, with pale lavender and lilac tones blending into deeper purples. A few dewdrops cling to the petals, catching the light like tiny beads of glass. The flower cluster floats… Continue reading Hydrangea Posy
Deepest Red
A portrait of a deep red dahlia from The Plantation Garden in Norwich, captured against a pure black background. The petals are richly saturated, glowing crimson and burgundy, with hints of purple radiating from the flower’s centre. The composition isolates the bloom in darkness, creating a sense of quiet drama, like a velvet curtain rising… Continue reading Deepest Red
Ballerina Pink
A close-up macro image of a pink dahlia, its petals unfolding in layers like silky satin shells. The focus is tight on the tip of a single petal, with the rest of the bloom dissolving into a creamy blur of pink and lilac tones, shadowed in the cup of the petals. The image glows with… Continue reading Ballerina Pink
Tiny Dancers
A delicate fuchsia in palest pink hangs like a tiny lantern in the dark, its petals reaching out like outstretched arms while long, slender stamens fall gracefully below. Softly blurred in the background two siblings add a whisper of companionship. The deep black backdrop makes this little flower glow as if lit from within –… Continue reading Tiny Dancers
Rudbeckia at Dusk
Captured in the gentle hush of early evening in the back garden, two images of the same rudbeckia plant – currently showing a profusion of bold, daisy-like blooms whose golden egg yolk yellow petals still glow in the low light. In the first image, we’re drawn so close we could almost the flower beneath our… Continue reading Rudbeckia at Dusk
Velvet Bumble Bee
A velvet-bodied bumblebee, round and plump like a ball of thistledown with purpose, clings tenderly to the soft embrace of a lavender blossom. Its fuzzy coat is a patchwork of midnight black and sunflower gold, each strand glinting with whispers of pollen—a dusting of nature’s treasure gathered in earnest work. The bee’s head is bowed… Continue reading Velvet Bumble Bee
Beetling About
A mass of pale fluffy white and pale pink – thistledown, with the ghost of a couple of the thistle seed heads at the bottom of the frame. Seemingly suspended in the dreamy white mist (and yet actually standing on the soft downy seeds) is a long, slim orange beetle with long antennae and dark… Continue reading Beetling About
Glass Fly
A dreamy pastel coloured overhead shot of the most amazing glass like hover fly on a pinky lilac thistle type flower. The little insect has a banded yellow, black and white striped body. Their wings are so delicate and nearly transparent – all save the strong black veins in them. Their large orange compound eyes… Continue reading Glass Fly
Old Bee
Yesterday evening a very slow moving, pale furred bumble bee was (literally) hanging about on the lavender in the back garden. Unlike the other busy little bess she was just bumbling about, seeming very tired. She wasn’t flying from bloom to bloom, but walking. I would guess she was quite an elderly bee. Or very… Continue reading Old Bee
At The Butterfly Farm
A couple of months ago Vision Norfolk Viewfinders took a trip to The Bug Parc, which is not far from us if we take the Vision Norfolk minibus. Or The Blindie Bus, as I call it. As in “The Blindie Bus is coming, and everybody’s stumblin …” which I believe is a Venga Boys B… Continue reading At The Butterfly Farm
Poppy Seed Head
Every year I throw as many poppy seeds at the garden as I can. Some years they don’t sprout, and some years they wait until next year. And some year they only take in some areas. Last year they all waited, en masse, until this year to show themselves. Unfortuntely they all sprouted at the… Continue reading Poppy Seed Head
Butterfly Dreams
In the front garden one of the massive buddleia bushes is already in full flower. True to its other name – the Butterfly Bush – it is covered in bright colourful flutterers. This Peacock butterfly clung delicately to a cluster of purple blossoms, bathed in warm summer light. Its wings, partially open, blaze with vivid… Continue reading Butterfly Dreams
Dark Fire
In the shadows of the Buddleia bush in the front garden are amazing Lucifer Crocosmia flowers. These tropical beauties spring up on long slender arched stems, ending with amazing fiery red orange sprays of flowers like little trumpets. They bloom in pairs either side of the stem, with the flowers further from the tip opening… Continue reading Dark Fire
Ladybird
In the garden a stout tomato red ladybird was going about her business this evening. Or eating the tiny delicate tangle of stems and minuscule buds of white flowers that was she climbing on – which I believe is Hedge Bedstraw. Seen here in a dreamy cloud of pale green and white, we’re slightly underneath… Continue reading Ladybird
Turkey Tail
Last year a friend gave us some large wood slices from his woodland garden. They were already colonised with amazing Turkey Tail fungi. Flat creamy fans layer themselves on top of each other. Each fan is ringed with gold, rust, and grey bands – and sometimes even a dusty blue. They get coated in bright… Continue reading Turkey Tail
Little Parasols
I believe these are a variety of Glistening Ink Cap fungi, palest cream and brown at the cap edges, clustered in the deep gloom of the forest floor. Bright green moss forms a carpet underneath.
Flighty Whitey
A Small White Butterfly perches neatly on a tuft of purple Verbena bonariensis. The tiny flowers cluster together to form a bouquet of nectar rich blooms, and the creamy white Butterly rests on them as if posing for us. One inky black spot marks their veined triangular wings. This little one was a real challenge… Continue reading Flighty Whitey
Femme Fatale
A fat white crab spider lurks on a deep lilac bluebell as it peeks of the gloom of the woodland floor. She may be pale and interesting, but she’s deadly too ! – if you’re a fellow insect, that is.
Dark Delights
A dark purple Chrysanthemum flower centre, with closely packed pale cream stamens, adorned with water drops like jewels. The outer petals fold into inky darkness.
Tulip’s Kiss
Oh so mysterious, oh so sensuous ! A deep purple tulip lined with white at the petal edges glows quietly from the inky black shadows. The petals hint at softness, gentleness, and something wondrous.
Alien Invasion
A strange upturned umbrella of funnel like seeds spouts, papery and pale, rise from a flat green blue base. What flower is this ? Is it too strange and out of focus to say, there merest hint of form in the blur.
Snowflake Stars
In the deep shade of the trees tiny white multi petalled flowers reach up to find the spring sun. Their trumpet like blooms open to the warmth, with tiny pollen dusted yellow centres advertising that business is open for bees and insects. Only one of the three here is in focus, the two behind are… Continue reading Snowflake Stars
Sparkling Seedhead
A golden brown seeded on a slim stem bursts open like a firework, throwing tiny dandelion like seeds into the blue green background.
Snowdrops
Nodding their white and green fringed heads the gentle snowdrops nestle in the deep green of the woods. Beyond them bokeh balls of white light in the blue green haze hint at the brighter sunlight beyond the trees.
Hydrangea Stars
Emerging from darkness are lilac pink hydrangea flowers, their four petalled blooms crowding together and fighting for attention. Their texture looks almost papery, and the delicate reaching stamens at the centre a gentle purple.
Red Campion at Dawn
At the side of a shady path through the woods grow Red Campion flowers. Searching for the early summer sun they reach up to greet the dawn, their slightly furry stems and leaves glinting with silver. In the background a dream of green and early summer light hints at the day ahead.
The Three Amigos
Three candy pink Japanese Anemones span side to side of a frame filled with deep shadows and smears of pink. The flowers centres are like golden yellow crowns above the splayed flurry of petals.
Butterfly Hydrangea
Out of the black comes a single four petalled hydrangea flower, its pink petals flattened and the tiny nub of the centre sitting neatly. It is almost like one of nature’s spaceships coming in at an almost flat angle to land. Behind it indistinct siblings fade into the background.
The Ghosts of Summer
Spent Hydrangea flowers, papery and golden brown, their slim stick like stems bearing them aloft in a haze of blue green. Tiny seed heads of brown dance above the whispering faded petals.
Soft of Sight Photography 