Property Extension Ideas… a Bird Brained Idea?

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

I love seeing unexpected things when I’m out and about.

On this occasion I glanced up and saw that someone had adorned a blank wall of a house with some small extra accommodations.

Accommodations for birds…

We can’t have pets due to the allergies to fur and feathers of Kiwi Daughter and I,  but earlier this winter I started putting out food for wild birds on our balcony, and I am enjoying their visits  more than I expected.

These birdhouses have set some thoughts in motion,  although we don’t have a wall nearly as high as this one, but we probably do have enough space for at least one of these bird apartments… maybe even two, and one of our two walls might be suitable (the other balcony houses the BBQ).

My ignorance of birdhouse stuff and bird habits is rather large, do birds even still use the nests in summer? or will the chicks have flown by then?

I’m inspired to do some research, both into birdhouse purchases and into finding out if our little patch of wall is big enough for whatever birdie needs birds may have.   Watch this space…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

A Birds Eye View… of Butts!!!

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

I was watching the News yesterday feeling rather sorry for people in the United Kingdom as snow moved in on the other side of the North Sea and started blanketing the country.

Himself and I don’t  like snow: actually I need to quantify that…we don’t mind snow if there is no necessity to go outdoors for as long as it lasts and there is a massive log fire, slippers, comfort food and a douvet involved.

We are tropical types, give us long warm days full of sunshine any time and we will be happy bunnies.

I have a lousy head cold and a headache so went to bed early, Himself had a full schedule away from home and Kiwi Daughter got sent home from school sick on Thursday so we turned the heat up in my bedroom downstairs and she crawled into my bed so that we wouldn’t keep the lads awake with our coughing all night.

Himself got the fun chore of climbing into Kiwi Daughters high bunk bed for the night, having unceremoniously evicted jettisoned a small mountain of soft toys, so that he could creep out in the morning without disturbing the household. He mentioned casually that it would probably be a cold night as he wished Kiwi Daughter and I good-night and left us coughing and wheezing and stocked up with tissue boxes, nose drops, cough lozenges and paracetamol.

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

It was a surprise therefore to open the curtains on Friday morning that discover that the whiteness I assumed was fog, was actually a thin layer of snow.

I took a photograph of the snow and Kiwi Daughter emailed it to her school friend who’s family have just gone to live in Singapore.

Later in the day Himself came back home and needed to dash out to get some things for dinner, so I asked him if he could also  pick up some bird seed or bird feeder things because I was feeling sorry for the littler birds out in this cold weather.

That’s how late yesterday we ended up with a mesh bag of peanuts and some balls of fat and bird-seed tied onto the balcony washing line outside my bedroom.

Being later in the afternoon the light wasn’t brilliant and after it was tied on Kiwi Daughter and I sat on the bed and waited but the birds ignored it, so we gave up and had a nap instead but I kept the camera next to me on the bed.

I woke to find Kiwi Daughter had left the bed and that the birds had decided to visit after all, so slowly reached over for the camera.  I was under the covers so I think that therefore maybe this time the birds can’t have realised I was there.

I zoomed in as much as I could and started clicking.

I can now confirm that  Sir David Attenborough need not fear… my wildlife photography “talent”  (ha ha)  isn’t  quite  ready for the BBC Natural history department just yet LOL. I do however seem to display a talent for capturing bird bottoms! (either that or the birds did realise I was there and were mooning me!!!)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

I’m as Proud as a Peacock!

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Another page of my diary where at the moment I am documenting our travels to New Zealand and back earlier in 2012.

Now we are on our way home to the Netherlands but since we have a friend here in Singapore our stopover’s here have gradually gotten longer and longer.

After a brilliant day-trip to Melaka, Malaysia yesterday everyone is feeling tired and lazy today so a little while after breakfast the kids drag Himself to the pool for a swim and I do a bit of cleaning and tidying in the room.

There’s a washing machine available in the hotel (that I posted about here: 
http://kiwidutch.wordpress.com/2012/01/16/new-572/
) so I’m sorting dirty clothes so we can do a load of laundry and cleaning out the little refrigerator in our room because we put some bread in there for Little Mr. the day before yesterday and he didn’t eat it.

He hadn’t been hungry at breakfast but has an annoying habit of declaring he’s ravenous about an hour after we’ve left the hotel breakfast table so I’d packed some bread rolls and a croissant for him and put them in the fridge and half of it was still there two days later.

Now I’ve got some fruit I want to put into the fridge, and the bread’s gone rock hard so I broke up the bread and put it on the table outside our room for the birds.

About fifteen minutes later whilst I’m tracking down discarded kid socks on the floor around the pull-out bed in our room I catch a movement outside in the corner of my eye and look up just in time to see a peacock  flying up onto the wall between our patio and the next room.

Forget the socks, I’m now reaching for my camera as slowly and as swiftly as I can, scared that any sudden movement will frighten the bird away but also if I move too slow that the window of opportunity will be lost. My first shots are taken through the glass window but as both the bird and I grow more confident with each other’s presence I summon up the courage to ease the sliding door open  just enough to poke the camera lens out …

Bracing myself on the bed I attempt to try and zoom in as much as possible… a little drama unfolds as a little bird with a bright yellow beak and matching  knee socks joins us, then another, until peacock decides that three’s a crowd on the table and that the supply of bread looks like disappearing a little too quickly at this rate and shoo’s them off in no uncertain terms, but not before the interlopers had stolen some breakfast to take with them.

Peacock tolerates my presence at close quarters but then all of a sudden begins a song and dance that involves much feather ruffling and fluffing up of it’s rear end… did I startle it?  No… the song and dance turns out to be for the mate who turned up to see where the party’s at.

I get to see a full feather display but these peacocks have their bright colours like jade necklaces at their necks rather tan on their tails, very different from their European cousins. Wildlife photography is a bit of a hit and miss affair with me so far (actually if I’m really honest it’s usually “miss”) so I was delighted for a chance to  practice a little with an obliging and somewhat  tame model.  Here are the results…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

I’m going to call this next shot the “Vogue Cover Shot Pose’ …

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

And the shot I like best of all? …This one…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Shooting the Wildlife….

It’s not often I get to attempt taking wildlife photos… the city birds who settle on our balcony are wary of the tiniest movement and I don’t have a particularly long lens on my camera to get good shot of them in the nearby trees.

Sitting at the end table of the  Fat Pigeon Café in Piopio, New Zealand  and with Little Mr. busy digging in the sand-pit close by (and therefore not being available to be waving his arms around in excitement  or wiggling on the seat in such a fashion to scare off our little visitors) …  I stood half a chance at one of my first attempts.  Ok it’s far from perfect, but it’s a “try”at least, and not having a tripod to hand it was a challenge too.

The birds came for the bread bits that Little Mr. hadn’t wanted so once they dared to get in close enough to grab something they didn’t waste any time chatting or saying hello to us,  they were just focused on getting away as quickly as possible.

Phase One: they watch us and we watch them… from a safe distance…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Phase Two: tentative steps…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Phase Three: They check that the little noisy one who makes sudden scary movements is not too close:  Good… he’s busy….

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Phase Four: be brave! rush on on, there is treasure here!

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)