Spring wild flowers | wildflower photography | British wildflowers
I headed up to Ox-close Woods today to photograph spring wild flowers in a British woodland setting as the forecast had been for a cloudy bright day which is perfect for flower photography. However, by the time I arrived at the site, the sun was blazing away and the wind was gusting making flower photography really quite tricky! I’d mainly gone to photograph the very rare herb-paris (Paris quadrifolia) although I figured I wouldn’t better what I have done here before and I was right. The plant wasn’t in such a good spread as when I last saw it so I decided, rather than redo what I have previously done, I’d try something different with a 16mm fish-eye and some tight shots with the 200mm macro shooting from above. The bluebells were probably at their very best and the areas where stitchwort and bluebells flowered together were some of my favourite scenes. The wild garlic or ransoms was just incredible with large swathes on the woodland embankments and it was while I was photographing the garlic, I spotted some Jew’s ear fungus growing on one of the wooden steps, slightly backlit by the late morning sun. Although I noticed the small snail shell in front of the fungus, I didn’t realise until I was looking at the images on a large monitor, that there was still a snail in the shell and that it was munching on the fungus! I think I’ve identified it correctly as Cochlodina laminata, the plaited door snail.