Sunday 30 December 2012

A hundred today

Working for honey
Last June I pressed ‘publish’ for the first time and my life changed, perhaps forever. Little did I imagine that by the very last day of the year I would have made a hundred posts. 

My thoughts were then, that I would make two posts a month, max! Blogger ‘Shirl’ warned me, don’t let it take over your life! She warned me not to neglect my garden to manage my blog! Two new words have entered our family vocabulary, ‘blogbore’ and ‘blogweed’. The latter has become a generic term for ‘neglecting the garden to manage the blog!’ I deny that I have!

My learning curve has been steep. As a web dinosaur I knew nothing about blogging. Things like links were as big a mystery to me as to the rest of my generation. I had done my first few posts before I knew that if I clicked a coloured word in the text of my own post it sent me somewhere out in the ether. A friend had faithfully followed my blog for eighty posts before he learned that if he clicked ‘comments’ he could have his own say. 

I was advised that I should promote my blog by making comments on other web-sites. Once I discovered I could, with huge effort, pass the robot test - and even that I could have another try if I failed - I was away. I now look back with some disquiet at my earlier strident comments in other places. I should have signed myself Victor Meldrew! 

Clearly I had help. I would like to thank my two dear friends Cathi and Harry who held my hand, designed the site graphics and edited and placed my first posts. 

Part of my learning curve has been with regard to the site archive. My mental image was of a dusty place that no-one visited. I thought that posts just languished there and, although digitally preserved, had really gone forever, just like old books cluttering the bookcases around our house. Not so, and it has been fascinating to see in the google blogger statistics how old posts continue to live. Some posts soar high quite quickly, some like my glyphosate series are ‘slow burners’ where ‘hits’ build up steadily, and some are just duds!

Right from the beginning everyone said that wildlife pictures are popular. How right they were! This suits me fine. Not only do I love animals, but I was anxious to explain how I create wildlife habitats by my minimum cultivation methods and the use of glyphosate. Without this chemical management tool I could not maintain five acres of rich wildlife habitat in my 

Posts remembered

Poetry in motion
The bumblebee posts were popular



Let me go!

Harry rescued this beauty trapped in my garage and while the hawk remained quiet, confident and defiant in his grip, Brenda and I could not contain our enthusiasm as we snapped away. We still cannot agree who took the best pictures. Here he is a few days later- still in charge!

King of the castle
Busy butterflies

The Open day photographic competition brought in some very fine entries. Very special thanks to the husband and wife team Martyn and Lesley Webster.



Still whistling

When Sue Doherty started her new blog 'Chicken Whisperer', the play on words with Whistling ducks was too much to resist. Sue’s recent post is shear genius!


The one that got away

I was sorely tempted to enter the Bishop of Llandaff (with his little goatee beard), for the recently vacant Archbishop’s post. On further reflection I decided that the blog might not go down very well at the palace.

And three misses 
I could not resist taking a picture of one of my ‘babies’ from my old Bolton Percy garden.

The corn marigolds in the next door field were so superb. I think I will try again next year  

The black panther did not bite.



The Lily beetle created a few gasps - of horror! 



The ghost of posts to come



I have waited a long time to publish this picture. The end of the year might be just the right place!


15 comments:

  1. Hello! I've only just found your blog and it's really interesting to read just how far you've come and how much you've enjoyed blogging! I started mine right at the end of October and the worst thing I find is not having enough time to read. I still make time for gardening but when I first started thinking about blogging I had a 2hr commute each day so had time to read. I have my bloglovin account set up but you guys post so often that if I miss a few days I have hundreds of posts to catch up on! You take really good photos, what sort of camera do you have? Best wishes for 2013 :)
    Anna B

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    1. Thanks for the good wishes Anna. Most of my pictures I take are on a Canon IXUS 9015, however the best wildlife pictures are ....... I shall follow your blog. Best wishes

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  2. I love the dragonfly. The caption should be...the arse end of the year!

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  3. Great stuff Roger. The wildlife pics on your blog are fantastic.

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  4. I loved the sparrowhawk post! Brilliant!

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  5. Well hello again, Roger! Congrats on 100 posts – you are at break point now… I wonder how many posts you will publish in the year ahead. I predict a fair few more ;-) I hope to increase my tally of this past year too so we’ll see each other around blogland in 2013 :-) All the best!!

    Btw great pics here and you are on a winner if you keep these coming. Love that last one – got heaps that I am waiting on an excuse to use here too :-D

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    1. Thanks for the good wishes shirl, I am building up a large library of pictures that might be useful for future posts. Unfortunately most of them are poor ones but I am not very good at moving them to trash---just in case
      Poor Brenda has had to get her own computer,at least I get less complaints now!

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  6. Well done on your 100Th post.

    You have a nice blog, and lovely pictures.

    I'm still quite new to Blogging myself, after 45 blogs i've only just discovered how to link to another blog from mine. Ha.!

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    1. Glad I am not the only one CG who has had to learn these things- but its fun finding out!

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  7. Good post Roger. We will look forward to following in the new year. There have been some good arguments in your comments and it's obvious that they aren't moderated, which is great.

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  8. Congratulations on the 100th post.Some beautiful photos too.

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  9. Happy New Year and Happy Blogging Post Centenary, here's to the next 100 posts. I for one will be looking forward to them.

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