I love the old stems splaying out from the centre of the photo mixed in with the opening buds.

Nice!

Perhaps it could be cropped a little closer - for instance, to me, the far left of the photo is getting so blurred it’s ceases being a good backdrop.

Also, bear in mind there’s no rule that says the centre of the focus (or indeed, centre of interest) has to be in the exact centre of the photo. Indeed, there’s an “The Rule of Thirds” suggesting the centre of the photo is entirely the wrong place for the centre of interest. Personally, I let my personal taste guide me in balancing the composition, for better or worse, neither always centring, yet not always avoiding it.

“For example, she said Egyptian mummified persons were excavated and brought back to Britain, for racist pseudoscientific research.”

As opposed to the utterly respectful local descendants of those times, who, if they got there first, unwrapped the mummies, took any precious metals for resale (often melting it down first), and discarded the rest on the ground - playthings for dogs and children. Oh, or used as fertilizer, of course.

Traveller’s journals of the Nineteenth century seem to all have at least one account of the traveller’s horror of unearthed, looted and broken mummies left scattered on the ground.

As for European and Local looters, in Pharonic times up to 2011, can I recommend “A Short History of Tomb-Raiding” by Maria Golia?

So, perhaps “We should do better” today, but don’t pretend back in the “Golden Age” of Egyptology that the locals in Egypt were not as bad as the Europeans in their disrespect.

Full on screaming “Arrrgh, make it stop” I think :)

Indeed - I would contend taking up bird photography has the great benefit that you look again at all the common birds, and usually find them beautiful in a certain light or pose (Crows and Pigeons come to mind).

To a UK bird book, it’s just a “Goldfinch” Carduelis Carduelis, I’m afraid. Wikipedia has it as “European Goldfinch” , but that I suspect is just to help confused folk across the big pond.

Male and female broadly look the same, so that’s quite possibly a mated pair.