Welcome back to my weekly blog, this week again a walk thought of the shots taken on the weekend in the Australian Botanical Gardens, Mount Annan. 

First up something different a bee hive in a hollow of a gum tree. The bees are always active around this one and looks to be traces of honey below the hollow on the trunk.  This ones in the first group of trees in the gardens just as you drive in, before the main ring road around the gardens. 

In the same area I noticed the amazing textures on this branch in a nearby tree, I'll have to revise this one a few times to see what I can work with this one, different light and different focal lengths, but the patterns are amazing on this one. 

Again this shots from the same location a small water holes at the base of all these trees so plenty of Bird life around these ones, this ones a female Red-Rumped Parrot (Psephotus haematonotus) at another hollow. Again all these are before you hit the main ring road in the gardens. 

Next up around the back of the waterhole on the flats was this Royal Spoonbill (Platalea regia) This ones been around the east few weeks so a few shots of this one now of late. The trick here is to get the exposure right without blowing out the white feathers.

From there I moved on a little further thou not to far this ones on the first large lake as you drive into the gardens, in the reeds while trying to catch a shot of the Australian Reed-Warbler I say the reeds move thinking it was the reed-warbler I found it was instead a Litoria fallax (Eastern Dwarf Tree Frog). I don;t have to many shots of front for the gardens so even wiht the reeds in the way this one turned out OK. 

Across the lake on a small island a pair of Little Black Cormorants (Phalacrocorax sulcirostris) were sitting around drying off. The black contrasts nicely with the greenery in the Background in this shot. 

From there I drove up to the connections gardens to see if there are any Mushrooms about this week after not finding any the last few weeks, this week was not to be any better so no luck finding mushrooms to shoot, So had to look for something else and came across this acacia seed pod, which made for an interesting subject. 

After no mushrooms and time getting away I headed down two the two main lakes to see what was about and came across this Male Red-Rumped parrot, pretty plain to see how this one got its name. 

This one was most co-operative so I managed both front and back shots of it. 

Flying up the lake was this Little Pied Cormorant (Microcarbo melanoleucos) on its way to its nest. Even zoomed in as largest as I can this one is still heavily cropped so the image is stating to loose the detail in this image. 

These next two are of the young in their next arguing over a bit of bark The Second shot has them on the lookout for the return win the next meal.

Last up for this week a little Black cormorant again cursing the lake this time. These ones sit low in the water all the better for diving.

Thanks for dropping by my blog this week, I'll be back next week with more.

Glenn.