Nature Features

My name is Alison Devlin and I live in SE17 just off the Old Kent Road. I've lived here since 1989 and in London since 1986.

I worked as an accountant and a stage tech/roadie for 20 plus years until the photography took over one day.....

I needed to learn how to use this camera - and I needed to learn this all as soon as I could. There's usually only one way to make this happen and that's to get out and do it!

I started to photograph my local area - I suddenly realised that photographing my local community and area was a good way of cataloguing the wildlife that lived here and the changes expected with the regeneration of the Aylesbury Estate.

London Pigeon in mid flight - A.Devlin

It's one of those things you always think of after the event - ''oh, I wished I took a photo of that before it was knocked down'' or ''I wish I photographed the pink blossom - it was gorgeous this year''.

Most days I take 40 plus photographs and most of the local people see me out and about on a regular basis snapping away. I must look completely mad when I go out early in the morning to lie on the frozen green taking photographs of frozen
daffodils! or out after midnight trying to capture the moon over the estate!

After you have been taking photographs for a few months you really start to see what's all around you the whole time and how it's constantly changing. I've gotten to know all the local birds, squirrels, foxes, insects and bats. It is truly wonderful when you see the birds bringing out their youngsters for the first time - especially the Starlings as they look like they're arguing the whole time!

It still stuns me that Swifts fly in from Africa to spend a few months living next to the Old Kent Road!

South London sunset - Alison Devlin

You would think that living in the middle of London there would be no wildlife at all - but there is HEAPS all around us.