This weeks blog post is of last Saturdays walk in the Australian Botanical Garden's Mount Annan, By now you will have probably notice I spend a lot of my weekends here photographing what mushrooms I find plus the various Bird life I come across. One of the reasons for this is its so close to my home, form the Gardens you can actually see my house so pretty close, still ten minutes drive away, but a great place to practice photography.

So Last Saturday I set off in the afternoon to see what I could see. 

First thing I found what this unusual Mushroom, looks a bit like a loaf of bread straight out of the oven. The colour and the way the top is broken like a loaf of bread expanding to quickly which is probably exactly what happened here with this one. Shot with two speed lights one on the left with a brown gel, Which is basically a coloured piece of clear plastic that goes over the flash to add a slight colour cast to the shot, the second speedlite on the right is in a small softball and adds a fill light to the shot.  

The same location that this mushroom was the Yellow face honey eaters frequent so I managed another shot of one of these, still haven't got a really decent one of these yet so more patients needed for the looks like, I'll get one one day, but this is the best I got of one of these this week. 

From there I walked along the track a little way and came apon this Eastern Yellow Robin, this one was jumping about catching insects, they usually sit on a branch like this one studying the ground and then drop on some unsuspecting Insect. This one didn't stay long there before diving off for another feed. 

A little further along was this Golden Whistler, As usually I heard it well before I saw this one. Another one I need a better shot of. So will need to keep an eye out for these next time as well, Slowly getting my collection of decent shots of the various Bird life in the gardens but a long way to go yet. 

Around the same area was this little Rose Robin, not the best view of this little one so no real details of the rose coloured front it wears.

As I walked back to the car along the road this time for a change I spotted this pair of Wrens hunting insects. the first is a female Variegated Fairy-wren where as the second is the Superb Fairy‑wren,the difference being the Blue tail of the Variegated Wren and the brown eye patch of the Superb wren. Both Females, the males of these are much more shy. 

Once I got back to the car I drove up to the Wollemi pine Walk of Discovery to see what mushrooms were growing up there this week as usual I managed to find a few, the first one was the better shot of the day Mushroom wise. Again light with two speed lights off camera. 

I found a second grouping close by but the shot did;t quite work out a little to dark and not fully focused this time, Oh well better luck next time. 

I then drove back to the main car park near the visitors centre and took a walk through the connections Gardens where the light was improving getting closer to sun set so I had a go at a few flower shots, neither of the two, I'm overly happy with so need to take a little more time with thees next time.  

From there I walked down tot eh two main lakes and I found this family of Purple swamp Hens sharing an Apple, the Parent Bird has the apple held in its foot, I has broken off a piece and the two juveniles are taking if from their parents beak. 

On the main flat grassy Green were a flock of small red Rumped Grass Parrots, there is a fairly large flock there as usual at this time of the afternoon when the gardens start to empty out and the parrots come down for the last feed of the day. These parrots are a little larger than a Budgerigar and a lot more solid. 

As I was walking back to the car to head home for the day I noticed a small group of swallows flying over the lake and diving in for a quick bath and then continuing along their way, so the last shots for the day are of these little guys hitting the water and continuing on. 

Hope you liked this weeks Blog post of my photo walk in the Australian botanical Gardens, Mount Annan.

Thanks for dropping by my blog.

Glenn.