A number of cormorants make a living on the River Weaver, roosting on tall trees near Vale Royal Locks when they are not fishing. I have lost count of the number of fishermen who have complained to me about them and the number of fish they eat.

Usually, they are very circumspect, as if they sense the animosity of many of the humans on the riverbank, but this fellow seems much more tolerant (and maybe foolhardy) than the others.

I was returning along the footpath beside the river after a session with the little grebes, when I came across this youngster standing beside the river. When I stopped, and then moved closer, it showed no alarm or any inclination to fly away, so I took this shot from within arm’s length of the bird.

Presumably, it had just left the nest and not yet acquired the suspicion of humanity held by the other riverfolk.

At one point, the footpath passes between the river and a large shallow lake. A pair of little grebes has bred on a lake for the last few years, but have always built their nest on the far bank, where the ground is wooded and rises steeply. It has been very difficult to get a view of the nest there, but this year, they are raising a second brood from a nest which is just a few yards from the footpath.

Many people have passed me, sitting on my stool with my long lens on a tripod, and looked around the lake to see what I am after. I think that very few actually saw the nest. Even when I pointed it out to the few who asked what I was doing, they had great difficulty seeing the little bird sitting on its mound of vegetation.

As I walked along the river, a group of ducks were dozing and preening in the sunshine. Breeding over, raising chicks to independence completed. I remember a similar feeling, a long time ago. Job done.

Didn’t turn out that way, though. Humans ain’t ducks.

This evening was overcast, but there was a window of clear sky out to the west. Fortune smiled on me as the setting sun dropped below the clouds – it sent a shaft of golden light into the oak tree and illuminated the bough that was the parent owls’ favourite place for scowling at the world and bringing food to the chicks.

I had put a flashgun on a lighting stand aimed at the bough to illuminate them from the front – they would otherwise have been near silhouettes. With the lighting – both natural and man-made – perfect, the owls and chicks played their part and performed on their usual stage.

The opportunity to photograph these charismatic birds with their offspring lasted a mere four days, from the day they emerged from the nest-hole to the day they left the oak tree for the wider world. I was truly fortunate that those golden sunbeams lit up the bough in the oak tree for one of those days.