A Norfolk photographer has captured the moment she found a rare example of a natural phenomenon in her own back garden.

Tracey Robinson, from Gaywood, King's Lynn, took this photo of an ice spike she found in a teacup in her back garden on Sunday morning.

Eastern Daily Press: Tracey Robinson, from Gaywood, King's Lynn, is a photographer and author.Tracey Robinson, from Gaywood, King's Lynn, is a photographer and author. (Image: Tracey Robinson)

Ice spikes like this forms when a weakness appears in ice skin, and liquid water gets squeezed upwards through a hole.

But they are rare due to the exact mixture of air conditions needed to form – the temperature and wind speeds have to be perfect.

Mrs Robinson, a photographer and author, said she found the spike in one of the teacups which she leaves around her garden as drinking pools for birds.

Eastern Daily Press: Ice spikes found by Tracey Robinson in a teacup in her back garden. She said she and her husband had never seen anything like it.Ice spikes found by Tracey Robinson in a teacup in her back garden. She said she and her husband had never seen anything like it. (Image: Tracey Robinson)

She said: "It's a one in a million. I called my husband Eric and he said he'd never seen anything like it in his 70 years.

"If there was something dripping above it I would get it, but there's nothing. It was quite thick, and looked like a thermometer."