Monday 28 March 2016

Chickens everywhere

You might imagine that a walk that is taken at least twice a week would stop providing photographic subjects. It certainly gets more difficult to see new things but every now and then something shows up. Maybe it was never there before, which is usually obvious, maybe it was just overlooked. It might have been a trick of the light or a recent trimming of hedge and tree that allowed me to see a chicken weather vane I have been passing by for ages. My obsession with all things poultry kicked in and I took some photographs on my way to the village. Armed only with my macro lens I did what I could and vowed to return.
As the clocks had gone forward that very morning it was after tea that I set forth with a more suitable lens. As it turned out the focal length I used was damned nearly the same as my macro lens. Having suffered the usual fate of a bright sun hiding behind a dark cloud as soon as I got to where I intended to take some photographs that require its presence I eventually committed the crime of using the camera's pop-up flash to bring out the white chicken against the darkish sky. I keep trying various flash solution and always end up back at the pop-up through a combination of laziness and finding it actually does what I want most of the time.
From there I went on my usual roam around the playing fields and wood, as much for exercise as to look for photographs, ending up back in chicken territory where three flocks are kept along a short length of the lane. It's not unusual to see a hen or three crossing the road there, but I'd not seen one being carted back home before. It turned out to be a new arrival that had Houdini tendencies which was being taken to have its wing clipped to stop it flying over the fence yet again.
The wing clipping procedure is straightforward and something I'd like to get some better pictures of in the future. I was hampered this time by it being done over a gate. \A position more to my right would have been much better.
After the clipping the hen has to be consoled. It has to be said that the process doesn't seem to bother them at all. They are birds of very little brain.

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