Thursday 18th.6.2026

 Last week at the Bridge View Café there was a large group in from the Tameside Green volunteers.

We had our usual reserved table though so it was no problem.

I thought I'd better get down to Reddish Vale park, as I'd seen on their website that there were 5 cygnets all doing well so I went yesterday (Wednesday) and sure enough there they were!.

Dad keeping the ducks away whilst mum looking for juicy bits for the babies.

One of my fellow photographers there too,

Saw this young Magpie hopping around in the trees.

Plenty of crows about, I've read that they are the 5th most intelligent creatures on the planet. they certainly know when I'm about with monkey nuts!.

They have to be quick though before the squirrels get them.

This one tucking into seed though.

There were  couple of herons in the trees on the top mill pond.

These baby Coots are quite big now and I think that's mum telling them to get out of bed and get feeling themselves. 

Then to top the visit off there were two baby kestrel's in the nest box under the railway arches!.

When I first got there I couldn't see them but patience paid off and they eventually came to the front, no doubt waiting for their parents coming back with food. 

 There are a lot of young trees in front of the arches so it's quite hard to get a decent picture, but i'm quite happy with this one!.

Collared Dove looking for some seed!.

Mrs Quinney's bench was looking a bit worse for ware with all the bad weather we've had.

Then I noticed a new bench and saw it was for my old friend Olive Lee, I still see her husband Mr Ching and his grand-daughter in Morrisons.

He used to own the famous Chings restaurant on Reddish Lane, but it's now run by his son and been extended into next door and now called The Dragon Palace, lovely family.

Hope my mate Bob see's this as he and Olive went to an artists club together in Stockport I believe!. 

Surprised this week to find out an old mate of mine for years had written a book of his experiences in the Ambulance Service, with mentions also of the Auxiliary Fire Service before they closed that down after the Berlin wall came down.

The Green man of the title was a job we had done together at a house were the male occupant had been there dead for weeks and turned a lovely shade of green!, Ron's first job and what a job to start off his career!. 

Great guy, finished up living in Canada and running his own business!.

Back home 

The log rolls that have been in situ for 20 odd years have started to rot away so bought some nice edging stripes from Amazon to replace them all eventually when my knees get round to it!!.

My knees gave out here, all tomorrow not touched yet hey!.

Plenty more to go at!.

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9 June 2026.

 Can't believe it's been so long since my last post, I'll bet some of you thought I'd had the last post played for me, but I'm still alive but not doing much kicking though!.

Been over to the Debdale ressers to see how the Great Crested Grebes were doing with their babies, and they were all fine.

A bit to far away to get a good picture of the babies on her back though.

Coot babies were fine too.

Bath time for this Mallard.

Always a robin there to greet you.

This weeks visit to Costa at Sainsburys, had a nice Chicken & Bacon toastie and one of their fantastic Lattés 

Just love the decor at the new Café at Sainsburys.

Talking about food this week at Morrison's they had a new item on the menu.

I like their Chicken bites with Rice and chilli dip  but pass on the rabbit food (Salad).

My mate and his wife went away for the night to Blackpool last week and I got to have their beautiful girl Kimba, this is us watching telly!.

Out in the garden my bush had lots of flowers on last week and they were covered in White tailed bees, so that was nice to see, but the flowers only lasted a week, still hopefully they will be replaced with berries later for the birds in winter.  

Took an old Acer out, but it left a dark patch on my variegated privet I'd had off my mate Bob some years ago, but  think I've got it  under control now, soon be back to a nice cube!.

Bought this retractable hose reel and made a mess of installing it at first, my drills were so good I'd drilled the holes too deep!.

But good old Amazon to the rescue, ordered some longer Rawlplugs and they worked ok, Pheww!. 

The plants up the new trellis are pulling themselves up well.

That's a blue hydrangea with a Acer and you can just see a very small Monkey puzzle tree between them all seem to be doing well.

Will take the Monkey puzzle a lot of years to grow bigger, remember sister Babs had one in her garden in Nottingham that must have been 30feet high. 

Last week I fell off my electric bed, was going to get out to go to the loo, but fell out instead, first thought "there goes my hip or elbow" but luckily they were ok, but the switch that operates the bed came off the worse and snapped off. So ended up at 2 in the morning repairing that!

Gorilla Glue worked just fine!, took the tape off next morning and as good as new!.

  I caught the Blue moon last week, but you know its only called the blue moon because there are two full moons in the month. As it was further away from Earth at that time it looked smaller too.

Hopefully won't be so long next time.

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Monday 18.4.2026

 The last few days I've been on my own as my lady friend Jean has gone on a coach trip down to Devon to see her Daughter and grand-daughter which she hasn't see for a few years, so that's nice for her.

My other friend Peter is still suffering with the big C so not seen him for a while!.

Still life goes on and last Friday I went over to the Debdale ressers to see how the Great Created Grebes were doing 

At first just saw an empty nest!, but on looking round saw in the distance on the other side of the lake, the pair of Grebes and with my bino's saw they had some babies!. so it was off round the lake to get a bit nearer.

There you are, mum with at least two babies on her back!.

Dad was busy backwards and forwards with little fishes feeding the babies

This is one of my favorite shots from a few years ago, can see them being fed a bit better!. 

Sunday it was off to Costa Coffee at Sainsburys

Whilst there two couples of motorcyclists asked if they could sit next to me, I said delighted as I used to be a motorcyclist!. Seems they were going though from Grimsby to Wales, hopefully the weather stayed a bit better for them as it's been very wet here with some heavy downpours recently  

Saturday at The Bridge café, Brian the owner spent all morning changing the pictures round, all these on show are by a lady artist who is offering them for donations for a Kidney charity, so get down there and see if there is anything you fancy!.

Morrisons, today Monday my mate and I had the new menu shown and very nice too, with a choice of dip, we had the chilli.  

The new menu.

Finished this jigsaw this week that my grand-daughter had bought me for Christmas!. 

Very nice too.

Planted these fuchsia in the back garden but the heavy rain has battered the flowers off, hopefully they will grow again! 

The new gutters we had fitted a few weeks ago certainly got a good testing the last few days with the heavy rain, all is well with them!.
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