Persistence Pays Off

Here in the UK, we are pretty crap when it comes to any sort of adverse weather, be it wind, rain or god forbid, snow, you can pretty much guarantee that everything will come screeching to a halt. Usually, we need not worry about snow until late January to April here in the part of the UK where I live, so it was a bit of a surprise to wake to a good (for the UK) amount of snow this week, especially as when I went to sleep the night before, it was pouring rain.

I have been looking forward to getting out in the snow again, as we haven’t had a really good amount since March 2023 (I actually thought it was longer ago than that, but Instagram never lies….). So armed with my camera and Skylar (I wasn’t going to be able to leave the house without her), I headed out into the snow, to see what I could create.

My plan was to do our local walk and, on this outing, focus on landscapes as it was still snowing and as Skylar was with me, there was no way I would be getting close to any wildlife. I had my 24-70 GM ii lens, my favourite walk about lens (I say this, as the owner of a grand total of 3 lenses and this is my widest option) on the camera, and my 70-200 GM ii in the bag if I needed it, and also I planned to take some images of Skylar up the top of the hill.

Walking along, there was not as much snow around as I wanted, and I did find that things looked a bit ‘messy’ as the snow was quite patchy in places. You can see this a bit with this first image I took, while I do like it, I feel that if there was more snow, then it would isolate the tree a bit more, making it a stronger image.

I continued on my walk and got to the first of the sheep fields (for those wondering, Skylar is on a lead), again here, I feel that if there was more snow, the trees in the background would be less prominent and the sheep more isolated. I did spot a lone sheep a bit further on, so carefully approached and set my lens to 70 mm. I managed to frame her in a gap in the trees, which makes her stand out more, but again, I personally find the background too distracting with the bare patches on the hill behind.

We continued on and gained a bit of elevation, where I went a bit abstracted with my next image, trying to isolate the sheep trails in the gateway. While I do like this image, again, I think it would be stronger with more ground cover. I also took a wide shot here, which again I like, but I feel there isn’t a ‘main subject’ pulling you into the image, just a lot of supporting subjects.

A bit further on, there were some more sheep, and this time the background was a bit clearer, due in part to being further away, and less dominating. I used the sheep track as a leading line towards the sheep, and I feel that this image works well.

The further up the hill we went, the more snow there was, I spotted this tree further up the hill, which I really liked, so headed up closer to see if I could get a better composition.

I like the second image that I got, but unfortunately, I feel the bush next to it gets in the way and is a bit distracting. I did try to find some other perspectives of this tree, but they were all messy and bits were intersecting, however, off to the left I spotted some lone trees which looked EPIC and were exactly what I was hoping for. After getting my first image, I walked up a bit higher to I could see over the wall and the gate wouldn’t be cut off. I have to say I am really happy with this image, and think it is the strongest from the day.

I carried on my walk, almost having a mishap on a steep downhill section, before making my way up to the tippy top of the hill, where I got an obligatory image of Skylar and me, before commencing a brief photoshoot of Skylar, living her best life, in the snow (you wouldn’t know she was 11 ½!)

At this point, I decided I head home with Skylar (as she was quite wet by now) and get my big 200-600 G lens and try and find some wildlife.

Now, this is where my day started to fall apart, I thought that as the snow had stopped and the sun was shining, the wildlife would be coming out to feed, but (at least where I went) this wasn’t the case. I did manage to get a quick image of a Robin, in the trees, which I do like, but wasn’t the image that I had in my head (ideally I wanted it to be obvious it had snowed).

I continued down the lane and a motorbike passed me, which wasn’t ideal as I saw a lot of birds fly off. I did manage to get an image of some juvenile Goldfinch in the hedge, but they were quite far away, so it is more of a snapshot.

There were some Red Kites and Buzzards flying around, but as they were so high up, the images I got look a bit boring as they are just on a pain sky. Further up the hill, a Robin did stop off on the track for me, but again, it is just a snapshot and not a keeper image.

I walked all the way back up to the top of the hill, where I had been earlier, and I just couldn’t find anything to photograph, I was hugging the trees and shrubbery, but try as I might, I couldn’t see anything, so headed lower down into the woods, where again, I saw nothing.

At this point, I decided to call it a day as I was getting frustrated, also, I was meant to be cooking some BBQ beef brisket that takes hours, and I hadn’t even started… So, I headed home, with the plan of coming out again in the morning to try again.

The following morning was bitterly cold, so I donned all my clothes and headed out to a different wood to see if I could find any wildlife in there. My plan was to try and take it slower today, and find a spot to sit and wait where, hopefully, the wildlife would come to me.

On my way to the top of the woods, I got a fleeting visit from a robin in the holly, which I feel, again, can be added to my snapshots list rather than a special keeper image.

Once at the top, I found a spot and settled in, crossing everything that I would see something. After half an hour of waiting, and seeing nothing, I moved on to see if another spot would be better. At this point we had an un-forecast snow shower, so what was around, simply disappeared. I waited here to see if the shower would move on and after 20 minutes of no sign of that happening, I moved on again, heading lower into the woods. On my way, I captured this image of a sheep in the woods, which I quite like.

My spot this time, was in and around some holly bushes/trees which still had some berries on, but again, my patience was not rewarded, and so I once again moved on.

Rather than give up and go home, I thought I would try my luck on the back road again, and this was the best decision I made. On my walk through the farmyard, A very obliging robin perched on top of a fence post and I got one of my favourite images from the last 2 days. Unfortunately, the snow on top of the post had already melted away, but I am still really happy with this image.

I continued on, and another robin (or it could have been the same one to be honest), perched on some holly in the hedge and, I captured another keeper image, this time with some snow in the scene.

Whilst on my photo high, I headed down the back road and while it was quite quiet, I did spot a Grey Heron though the hedge out in the field.

I got to the end of the road and was now feeling rather hungry, having been out for a good few hours, so headed back home, where on the way I was treated to one final image, this time of a Goldfinch perched on top of the hedge.

I learnt a lot from these two days, one that I need to work on my patience more and not get frustrated when things don’t go to plan, and also the persistence pays off. If I had gone home after my morning in the wood, then I wouldn’t have any images to show for it, instead, I pushed through and got 3 images that I am really happy with on the wildlife front, as well as my image of the trees at the top of the hill with the wall on the landscape part of my expedition.