As we have all still been staying at home as much as possible, the Isle of Man Photographic Society decided that the members’ challenge for April should be titled ’Home and Garden’ to encourage us.

For the past season we have been having a different topic each month and so it was decided to continue this through the summer months even though we can’t meet in person.

The idea is that we take a number of photos on the topic, during the month, and upload them to our members’ Facebook page.

Hopefully when we start to have club meetings again we will be able to show them one evening.

So what did we decide to photograph?

We had a very good entry of around 80 images, and the most popular subject by far was garden birds.

The Courier has recently published a couple of articles on photographing birds and small insects, written by Chris Blyth, and our members have made good use of his advice.

The beautiful chirpy robin and our little sparrows were popular subjects.

Robins in particular are one of the easiest birds to photograph as they aren’t too easily frightened off. Sparrows on the other hand never seem to keep still, at least not for me!

We also had gold- and green-finches, and some thrushes.

All beautiful birds, it was difficult to choose which one to include with this article, but I hope you will agree that this cheeky almost tame robin waiting to be fed, is lovely and was taken by Diane McCudden.

Butterflies and other insects were also very popular subjects.

The weather here in the island in April was unusually warm and sunny and this helped to bring forward the flowers, so providing attraction and food for the insects. Bees, various kinds of fly, a red admiral butterfly and a ruby tiger moth all featured. ã??

A few other animals crept into the mix, some lovely cats, a couple of frogs, a hedgehog, and even a longtail!

Flowers featured well too, with primroses, cowslips, tulips, and masses of blossom images.

Some members ventured into the garden after dark, warmly wrapped up against the cold, we hope. During the month we had a super-moon, and really clear night skies.

There were surprisingly few indoor images, but what we got were lovely still life shots, portraits, and some really creative work, such as the beautiful iridescent bubbles by Steve Johnstone.

I hope you have enjoyed this small sample of our images, and will watch out for things to photograph in and around your own home and garden.

Many more images can be seen on our website iomps.com Please take a look under latest news, and also under reports.

Ruth Nicholls