May 2021 - Cheeky Pigeon

Pigeons are our second most common visitor at home. We are fortunate to have a huge collection of sparrows who mostly live in a quince bush near the front of the garden, by our living room. I think it gives them protection from any predator birds that may threaten them … and also it has some lovely red flowers in Spring (so I’m told: my colour blindness means that I can hardly distinguish the flowers from the glossy green leaves). 

But the pigeons come and stand around and gawp at the garden, at the plants, the food possibilities (lots of worms – yummm!) and, of course, anyone who sits in the garden. Our dog, Poppy, gets very worked up when she sees them and chases them away – so I need to keep her away when I want to take pictures outside.   

This pigeon was sitting on the back of a swinging bench we have and that I had pulled to the middle of the garden and hung some bird seed from the frame. It wasn’t a great place to sit down but we have another bench and some garden chairs that I could use. It seemed to be staring quizzically at me when I took the photo and I only noticed when I was editing it that its eyes were sticking out of its head, making it look really strange. Almost like a cartoon character!

I took the photo with a relatively small aperture, so that the background would be blurred, leaving the pigeon as the centre of attention. It’s well worth thinking of this when you take a picture – “How can I get my viewer’s attention on to the object of my photo?”

Some photos are artistic, some are fun – this one falls definitely into the latter category.