re the first: the crop was to get rid of the out of focus rear end of another goose(!). i know it's an awkward crop, but i thought it was better to remove a distracting element and leave this bird on its own. i didn't crop the wing - that was just my poor photography...this is what i took just after the first one (so you can see what the bank was like - kinda crowded and you can see the bird i cropped out. excuse the colour fringing...):
just after 'splash' by
alexharrison101, on Flickr
re the second: i don't know what a clone fill is. why would rotating help?