Input on some Country Images please

ok, so I prefer doing nature photography (critters, birds etc) but have been playing with some "country images". Would like to get your commets/suggestions on the images below and see any edits you would make to the images to improve!

#1

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hmmmm....no comments at all? Didn't think they were that bad!

I''ll be honest...composition-wise, there's really not a lot to hold the viewer's attention. In the second, you do a good job of using the fence line to help "pull" the viewer into the frame, but it ends in a blob of shadows at the trees...there's nothing of interest once one has been drawn in by the fence. Also, it seems like the left side has fallen out of the DOF range, resulting in out of focus.

I like the conversion on the first one, the second one has potential. Perhaps if you cropped out the shadow at the bottom left of the frame and converted in the b&w.

My critique is mostly the subject isn't terribly interesting to look at in the first one and it's dead center in the photo. The second one is more interesting as the fence sort of draws your eyes in but to what?

Thats what I was looking for. Composition so different in these images that working with critters. Need to work on training my "minds eye"

Appreciate your time and input!

The first image - I would have cropped out the building on the left. It distracts from the main subject. Also, when you're taking an photo of something like an old house straight on pics are boring. Find the one thing about the house that you find incredibly interesting - a rock in the chimney, a missing stair, an initial carved in the wood, something that makes is stand out from everything else youv'e ever seen and photograph that.

The second photo is out of focus, I believe. I'm having a hard time telling what I'm supposed to be looking at - the fence, obviously, but I'm distracted by both the foreground and the background.

I like the b/w in the first but I'd be tempted to crop the fence in the foreground.

I like the composition of the 2nd photo, but am not a big fan of muted colors in general (just one opinion).

Points taken,, thank you