Welcome back to my weekly blog on my photography from the week. Last week we had a public holiday here on the Thursday and like most of my company I took the opportunity to take the Friday as annual leave making for a four-day weekend here.  So, I managed an extra day of photography this weekend. 

First up a wrap up of the blog post visits from last week, with a tie for the most views last week coming from Australia and the United States of America. Then France, Israel and Italy all on equal number of views. This week only 5 countries viewing the blog this week.

So on with the review of this week’s shots, again mostly taken in the Australian Botanical Gardens, Mount Annan.  

First up a hand held shot of a Scotch Thistle (Onopordum acanthium) Thi sone was taken as a series of images hand help and focus stacked from 12 different images. Though these are closed as weed they still make for an interesting subject up close. 

Next up I revised the undercroft of the Plant bank to see what else I could do with that, I've seen some of the images some people have made from here so still working at getting the best out of this space. The Garden is a moss garden with the roof of the undercroft lined with mirrors. 

Walking thought the undercroft and up pas the plant bank to the small stand of gum trees on the left, is where I find a tree that has been shown the last few weeks here with many hollows, this week one hollow say quite a bit of activity while I was there this week. Started off with a pair of Red-rumped parrots (Psephotus haematonotus) in possession of the hollow. 

This next shot shows them on the look out with both turned skywards to see whats coming. 

Only to be displaced by a pair of Rainbow Lorikeets (Trichoglossus haematodus) 

The red-rumps didn't take to kindly to that and had a go at re-taking possession as shown in the next few shots with a few feathers flying. 

The dispute was settled when a Galah (Eolophus roseicapilla) flew down and took over the Hollow, it was up above watch the hole time and probably didn't like all the commotion going on down below. 

From there I walked along the path in the direction of the stolen generation memorial and stopped by the gum tree along the road to check out the hollows there to find a pair of Sulphur-crested Cockatoos (Cacatua galleria) sitting on top of one of the hollows. 

With summer in full swing here now and plenty of hot days the gum trees are starting to shed their bark now so in the coming week there will be plenty of stringing gum trees about with all assorts of interesting shapes, textures and patterns to shoot. 

Walking along the woodland path there are plenty of small birdlife if you stop and wait, this shots of a little Brown Thornbill (Acanthiza pusilla) This ones been banded by the Bird banding group in the gardens, as you can see the ring on its leg. These are all wild birds in the gardens but they are ringed and studied within the gardens. 

Nest up one of the many Rabbits within the gardens, these like most areas are pests and even if they look cute are not great for the gardens. 

This week there was plenty of bird life about and this next shots of a Grey Butcherbird (Cracticus torquatus) This one doesn't look like it brushed its feathers for the shot today. 

On a log in the small dam opposite the plant bank was this White-faced Heron (Egretta novaehollandiae) Not so happy with this shot the focus is slightly off on the eye of the bird where as the back of the bird is OK so looks like I needed a slightly more closed down aperture on this shot.

After that I drove up to the main gardens the connections gardens and tried out a panorama of the gardens.

Plus a few shots around the water garden.

The water  garden usually has a few Eastern Water Dragons (Intellagama lesueurii) in residences today one was happy to pose. 

This next shot taken at the full 600mm showing all the detail of the head. 

While walking in the connections gardens, I heard a High pitched bird call and soon found the bird attached to the voice, this ones a male Mistletoe Bird (Dicaeum hirundinaceum) Not the cleanest of shots, this one wasn't in the mood for posing today. Maybe next time. 

I started to make my way back to the car for the day when I saw this pair of Little Pied Cormorants (Microcarbo melanoleucos).

While across the lake another White-faced Heron was coming in to land. 

The next day I returned and found the Red rumps at a different hollow in the same tree as earlier on. 

Also in the woodland was a pair of Pacific Baza (Aviceda subcristata) These were both pretty high up in the tops of the trees. They were in different trees and everyone and then would call to each other. 

Walking again through the woodland area I found this Grey fantail (Rhipidura albiscapa) showing off. 

While a Red-browed Finch (Neochmia temporalis) watched on to see what all the fuss was about. 

Walking a little further I came across this young not fully coloured up Eastern Rosella (Platycercus eximius) take some shade in the canopy.

So a good collection of birds about this weekend, no wonder this small Lace monitor (Varanus varius) was doing the rounds to see what it could find. 

I didn't manger to find any mushrooms about tin the gardens this week, but there was this little group of bright yellow Mushrooms (Leucocoprinus birnbaumii) growing in one of my pots of Kangaroo paws SO I took a few shots of these of this weeks mushroom shot. 

So thats it for this weeks rap up of shots for the week a bonus week with an extra day of shots so a few more shots than normal here this week. Next week will be back to normal. 

Thanks for dropping by my blog this week. 

Glenn.