Richard Bell's nature sketchbook since 1998
Last Sunday morning we had a gentle summer shower, a rare event so far this month, and I spotted a garden snail emerging from the edge of a riverside path: a determined-looking snail.
But when I stopped to photograph it in its dynamic (for a snail) pose, it immediately adopted this startled, slightly withdraw pose.
Drawn in Procreate on my iPad Pro.
Otter spraints neatly deposited on a mooring bollard by the canal at the Bingley Arms, Horbury Bridge. I’ve yet to see one of the otters but I was told that they’d been picked up on security cameras near the river.
Next door’s staghorn sumac might be falling to pieces as it sheds its reddening compound leaves but the birds appreciate it. A party of blue tits and great tits forage every niche on its bark and branches, while a small warbler, tagging along with them, checks out the lower branches. Starlings fly in to eat the small berries, botanically drupes.
In local parkland, this wasps’ nest at the foot of an oak has been raided, presumably by a badger. You can see the remaining wasps clustered on the remnants of the nest.
We’re used to seeing the grey squirrels burying acorns and collecting sweet chestnuts but this autumn they’re showing a lot of interest in conkers. Just after I’d photographed this nibbled shell, a squirrel bounded across the path with a large conker in its mouth and headed into the cover of a holly.
Fur and feather textures drawn for my Naturalist Animal Illustration with Procreate
Domestika course by Román García Mora, using some of the virtual brushes he created.
Yes, I know that the portrait module was Tuesday, but how could I resist Winnie and Pepper – a 2-year-old St Bernard and his aunt – when I spotted them in the courtyard at Nostell?
But before I could get the shot I was after the two of them came to life, checking out the camera so closely that I might as well have switched to macro.
Luckily they soon settled down and I got my shot.
Happy birthday to Ben. And I’m glad to report that Superfast Fibre is scheduled to be rolled out to our neck of the woods in June.
Cocker spaniels Charlie and Lola, who, despite appearances, were born just one day apart, at Nosh, Pickering, this morning. Frothy dog by Nosh barista Becky. Thanks 🙂
Rainy, grey skies, a wind from the north, so it doesn’t feel like the first day of meteorological spring.
8.30 a.m.: A grey squirrel bounds across the lawn.
It soon realises that it can’t climb around the baffle on the bird feeder post.
It climbs into the hawthorn hedge and you can see it weighing up the possibilities. No, not worth it. It scampers off across next door’s lawn.
Google Translate is so useful when you need to find the Polish for ‘birthday’.
Just after I’d put this card in the post to Thalia in Glasgow we heard that Liverpool had been chosen to host Eurovision.
Coco, an English springer spaniel, at the Coffee Stop, Horbury Junction yesterday.
