Thursday, 20 February 2014

Watermeadows walk

I have been very happy recently that all of the birds that seemed to have disappeared have come back to our feeders once more. Over the last few days we have had huge gangs of squabbling starlings, chattering goldfinches, territorial great tits who have chased off everything else they can, our usual pair of blue tits; a gold crest even flitted through the trees yesterday. Although, we haven't seen our little mouse for a while, I suppose it could have become dinner for the tawny owls we sometimes hear...
Our walks around our local water meadows have been rather interesting too, although nothing would pose long enough for a decent photo! There have been the usual volery of long tailed tits calling to each other and evading our camera at every turn. The robins and blackbirds have also been in good voice, laying claim to their territories. Wandering along we heard a very loud rattling song, it seemed to fill the entire meadow, until we narrowed it down to the very top of one of the trees. It seems to have been caused by a mistle thrush, who got very angry when a chaffinch flew past and landed close by. That's definitely a first spot in the watermeadows for us.

 Today we also decided to go detour to go along part of a summer walk, part of the meadow that is usually just too wet at this time of year. I wanted to check if there was any frog spawn by the little 'bridge' yet. No frogspawn, but there were lots of pond snails all stuck to one of the posts. We could also see where the recent weather had taken its toll. Blocking our path was part of an enormous tree, that we can only assume was blown down by the strong winds. It will be interesting to see what will make this its new home as the year progresses.




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