The emerald heart of the forest

Its no secret for me to say that I love nature, I never feel more alive then when I'm out surrounded by trees, streams, rocks and rivers. I love the way that light falls through leaves, the way that barns and buildings become reclaimed. Ivy and brambles slinking into the cracks and binding everything in green.

The sound of birds above me and the song of the brook running over stones. Rustling leaves and the sound of rabbits brushing the undergrowth. Th dappling of sunlight passing through clouds. The wind, the rain, the sun and the forest, nature has its own living beating emerald heart.

And step by step man is killing it, encroaching further and further upon it and pushing it further and further back to its boundries to a pint of no return and it breaks my heart. Nature is precious and beautiful and like anything precious and beautiful it should be preserved. We should spend more money on it, build gardens around it, use less harsh chemicals on it and protect more of it.

This is the only way we can protect that most precious jewel, the emerald heart of the forest.

Broken glass and falling stars

 After a warm month of May I decided to go out and about taking pictures of what I could find outdoors. But despite the beauty of the natural world around me what I ended up being drawn to were the puddles upon the ground around me.

They reflected the sun and clouds beautifully and tinged with oil and blown by the wind the reflections they produced unraveled and became abstract shapes and patterns upon the ground.

Broken glass and fallen stars exploded in their depths or morphed to become some strange moon filled sky. I was enraptured by the abstract beauties they produced.

And so even though I set out to capture the beauty of May I caught in puddles broken glass and falling stars.

A charcoal sky

For the first few months of spring I decided to go out and try and capture the mood of the season. Unfortunately that mood had been predominately one of cold, sleet and steely grey skys. And while this wasn't idea for exploring or taking holidays it was perfect for capturing moody dramatic pictures of the sky.

Under this chrome dome branches from the trees spread capillary like over clouds and man made monuments alike. In the background the building sat like black sentries. It was a beautiful and apocalyptic world to explore with my camera.

As I wandered I took my time to sketch shade and light, capture contours, branches and leaves. In other words I changed the world with my camera and with it drew a charcoal sky.

Where refrigerators come to die

A few weeks ago I had nothing to do for a weekend afternoon, so instead of spending it inside the house I arranged to hang out with a friend. He was fascinated with decay and rust so I decided to take him to a beach that I had told him about, one where it seemed that refrigerators came to die.

The beach in question backed out onto a steel works, a power station and a rough housing estate and so the area itself was filled with rubbish, twisted bits of metal, tires, sheets of cloth and concrete. But what was ugly about it was also extremely beautiful.

The decaying beauty along with a cloudy dramatic sky gave the whole area a apocalyptic feel and made each object seem sad and strangely person like. As if they had come to that beach in order to find a place at the ends of the earth as their final resting places.

We spent the day there before climbing the nearby hill to take in the afternoon sun casting spears of light upon the city of Cardiff.

As we left we came upon some European truckers who said they wanted to show us something. At first I was a bit nervous but once we got shaking hands and chatting it turned out they had seen my camera and wanted to show me something. They had been parking trucks near the steel works overnight but when they did so they had found that the trucks had been repeatedly vandalised costing them alot of their livelihoods in petrol. These friendly people had just wanted to point this out to me in the hopes that someone would tell their story. Hopefully that way they would get someone to install a security camera where they parked. I promised them I would so the last photo of these is me fulfilling that promise.

I was glad I had come to this strange place, to the beach where refrigerators come to die.

RSPB: Batwalk

This is not an official RSPB post and any views or thoughts expressed on it are purely my own and in no way reflective of the RSPB as an organisation.

The RSPB work hard to put on amazing events for their volunteers and members of the general public to enjoy. One such event that was put on recently was a talk and a bat walk that took place around Cardiff's beautiful Bute Park.

As part of the event a member of Cardiff''s local bat group had come in to give us a talk on the subject and she had brought a rather cute friend with her, Podge the bat. First we got to learn all about the different types of bats; how they hunted, the way they fly and where they tend to roost before we got introduced to Podge.

He was super adorable and sleepy when he was fished out of the dish cloth he was resting in. We learned that his wing had been damaged and that he was therefore unlikely to able to ever fly again. We learned he was mostly fed on meal worms (as opposed to a bats natural diet of flying insects). After we had all been introduced to him he was put back in his portable hold to sleep.

Afterward we were all given bat detectors and went out into the park to look for bats. Unfortunately due to the time of year there weren't as many bats flying about as we would have liked but we still got to detect a few fluttering across the river.

So if you find bats in your home don't panic, they are small, harmless and just looking for a place to roost for a short wile and won't cause any damage to your house. Just remember that bats are protected under UK law so if you do have any problems try to approach the relevant statutory nature conservation agency.

Also remember that if you encounter any sick or injuried bats you should not approach or handle the animal but seek advice from the Bat Conservation Trust.

Little Chinatown London

During my trip to London I decided to spend a little time in the vibrate and colourful Chinatown. Located near the fun and theatre packed area of Leicester Square. The long square of streets that make up Chinatown is packed with interesting shops, pagodas, restaurants and even people performing political protests (including one man protesting China's stance on it banning the spiritual art of Qui Chung).

Tempted in by the fish, crabs and lobsters sitting in a tank I decided to explore a local supermarket took my time to wander round and take in all the strange and exotic spices, sauces and objects.

After exploring all of this I was hungry so I stopped at a Dim Sum restaurant and had some absolutely incredible food. I did order a touch too much though and so had to leave slightly defeated by the sheer amount of grub that was carried to the table.

I took some time to walk around Leicester Square and as the sun was setting I took the underground back to my hotel in Vauxhall. Overall I was very glad I had taken the time to explore Little Chinatown in London.

Dancing in colour

I felt the need to escape this weekend, to run away from life and have an adventure so I followed that urge and booked my bus ticket to London. There is so many touristy things to see and do in London that it can be easy to become blinded to some of the exciting smaller moments that happen in the city everyday.

After wandering through the city I returned to my hotel just as the sun was setting. It was coming home that I stumbled across a number of teenagers performing bike tricks in an alcove next the thames river. I was fascinated by the colour, energy and joy that these people found as they leapt through the air on their bikes.

As I followed them with my camera I tried to capture them flying through the air. Dancing in the light, shooting past coloured walls, landing tricks and occasionally landing flat on their arses. It was like they were dancing in colour and I was there to capture every glorious moment of it.