It's a pretty warm day. Nice and sunny with only a few sparse clouds in the sky. That's the situation right now, while I'm writing this post that will be published later in the evening, but ...
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... but the morning was cold and the ground around the pond at the edge of town was covered with frost.
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While passing by on my usual way to the grocery store ...
... I noticed plenty of birds ...
... that looked great in the frosty morning atmosphere.
These seagulls, the Chroicocephalus ridibundus ...
... formed a pretty large bunch near the water.
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Most of them were busy taking care of their plumage.
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Ducks and mallards were swimming back and forth across the pond ...
... slowly and graciously. Here you can see a male mallard ...
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... and this is the female.
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The grey heron (Ardea cinerea) was searching for small fish in the shallows on the other side of the pond.
At one point a seagull entered the scene.
There is a small floating house not far from where the heron was photographed.
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A cormorant was drying his feathers ...
... right there, near that small, wooden house.
There is a group of old, tall trees about ten meters from that bank of the pond. On one of those trees, I photographed this Great egret (Ardea alba).
With this photograph, the focus is back on the frostier side of the pond.
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A trio of cute white ducks just came out of the water.
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This old goose is one of the most iconic inhabitants of the pond.
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It's here since ... well, I don't know since when exactly, but it looks like forever.
It's a nice bird that always greets the visitors with a jazzy trumpet sound. In this photograph, the goose is picking a snack from the ground.
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While most seagulls were still on the ground ...
... this one was slowly floating near the center of the pond.
In this photograph, the seagull reached the area where the rising sun turned the water into liquid gold 😀or something like that.
When I took another look at the cormorants across the pond ...
... two were standing in front of the floating henhouse.
Soon one of them swam away.
The cormorants can be seen here only in winter. On the coast of the nearby sea, they are present throughout the whole year.
With this photograph, the focus is back on the seagulls.
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I spent plenty of time observing them ...
... and so I took plenty of photographs with them as main characters.
This is just a simple portrait against the blurred water in the background.
In this photograph, the frost is nicely accentuated.
Here you can see just one seagull surrounded by mallards.
In this seagull portrait, you can also see a female mallard blurred in the background.
As the minutes were passing, the light of the rising sun was reaching this side of the pond ...
... and soon the scenery became more vivid and colorful.
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At one point a woman entered the scene.
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She brought the dry bread for the birds ...
... and the quiet birds ...
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... switched to the feeding frenzy mode.
It was a joy to watch ...
... and there was plenty of action to photograph.
It didn't last long. Only ten minutes or so. And at the end ...
... some feathers were left behind.
AS ALWAYS IN THESE POSTS ON HIVE, THE PHOTOGRAPHS ARE MY WORK - THE END.
