Going to roost and Sunsets

Had a fairly domestic day today and, finally, managed to clean my very dirty car - I can see you all standing back in amazement! And why not? I did!

This afternoon I was out and about with my daughter and we gave my grandson a lift home from school - he was rather pleased!

So at about 3.45 I decided a quick walk around Bushey Park was in order and I just happened to have the camera in the car - Oh , Quelle surprise

The sun was beginning to set which caused some rather nice colour effects of the birds on the water. Although my garden pond was finally free of ice today, some still remained on the ponds and the park as evidenced by the birds seemingly "walking on water".




The sun then started to set in earnest and, with partial cloud cover, the sky became a mass of colour!




The clouds started to clear and the red ball that was the sun, hung very low in the sky, just above the horizon.

This had some amazing lighting effects on the trees and birds.
(I have not post-processed any of these pictures, so the colours are as real as when they were photographed.)





Another bonus of being there at the time I was, is that the birds were going to roost.

Several Jackdaws had gathered in the oak tree - this is just half of the tree (didn't have the landscape lens!!) and the other half was similarly occupied.

And several groups of Ring-necked Parakeets, often 20 plus in a group, flew over on their way to the roost
(Photographically this is a dreadful picture, but it demonstrates the Paras in flight)


And to round off the day....
an obliging Black-headed Gull

and Jackdaw
(I'm beginning to lose count of the number of times I've photographed this tree stump!)