Natural highs and lows

Well, today was the very epitome of a natural high and low, and I am still processing the resulting tide of emotions. Perhaps I should add that this rising and crashing wave of a trip was not brought on by LSD, but rather by L-tD. Let me explain. This morning, the Orkney Field Club held one of its monthly wildlife events. As the weather of late has been so unremittingly dreich and the ground is so thoroughly sodden, AG, our walk leader for the event, had the inspired idea of an urban ramble around some of the streets and green spaces of Kirkwall, capital of Orkney. At the allotted time, we met up in a large car park by the Peedie Sea, a man-made lochan which is occasionally referred to as the town duck pond. A circumnavigation of this water body was an excellent start to the walk, allowing good views of Mute Swan, Grey Heron, gulls (Common, Black-headed, Herring and Great Black-backed), Ringed Plover, Turnstone, Red-breasted Merganser, Goldeneye, Tufted Duck, Mallard and Long-tailed Du...

It's not unheard of for there to be the odd pun in these pages and, make no mistake, some of them are very odd. However, I must hang my head in shame and admit that in other circumstances I had missed a very obvious one in the title of the book I'm currently reading. I have been a big fan of Barbara Kingsolver ever since a blogging friend pointed me towards Prodigal Summer for its novel use of natural history in a novel. Her non-fiction too has been keenly devoured, especially Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. So just after New Year, when I discovered that BK had a new novel out, it soon found its way to my Kindle. About halfway through the book, it finally dawned on me that the story was almost like a work of Dickens, just transposed to the 21st Century and set in the USA. Today, I pondered whether that was a reasonable thing to wonder or not, so looked up a few book reviews for Demon Copperhead and guess what? It's a reworking of David Copperfield. As if I needed to cite evid...

Yesterday afternoon, for the first time this year, I spotted a Sparrowhawk flying through the garden. It was quite a fortuitous sighting, as I was sat on the sofa, looking across an upside down jigsaw whilst chatting with Megan. A silhouette flapped slowly by outside the window, a most un-Sparrowhawk-like manoeuvre, but it was flying into a westerly gale, which is what bought me the time to identify it. Then, this morning, a male hawk was briefly sat in a low Sycamore tree at the bottom of the garden, looking quite forlorn because we've temporarily run out of bird food and all the House Sparrows are elsewhere. Photo not from yesterday, as an example only This afternoon, I was in the office, elbow deep in admin, when two small flocks of Starlings hammered through the garden in quick succession. Ever the procrastinator, I let my eyes follow the two dark liquid spheres of mini murmurations, as both flocks compressed in size and then merged into one. It was a bit early for roosting beh...

Between Christmas and New Year, whilst all was white and wintry, the field over the road was a-throng with Fieldfares, Blackbirds, and Redwings foraging for food. Our aged cats, one more housebound than the other, were very intrigued and vicariously re-living their youth through the window. Into the New Year, a walk in the neighbourhood took us near to a local rookery just as the Rooks were going through their pre-roost shenanigans. [I am fairly sure that in places with more trees than Orkney, the Winter roost site and the Spring breeding site are in different woods. Here they do not have that luxury!] There were many corvids thronging in the air, but I have chosen this particular image as it contains four and twenty black birds. The reason being the rhyme. Another day, another local walk. This view is from the low cliffs and northern shores of Scapa Flow, looking across to the hills of Hoy (Ward Hill and Cuilags) and their dusting of snow. On the same walk, a detour through Gyre Wood,...

Recently, over a brew, NaHaL and I were chatting about all manner of things when I began reminiscing about a holiday in Orkney. It was many moons ago (blimey, nearly ten whole years), and I was accompanied by a staffer from a wildlife charity, who shall remain nameless for reasons which will become apparent. Now, quite possibly brought on by my hot beverage habit, a list was drawn up of a possible range of teas which could be sold in unsaid organisation's shops. This list has been filed away on my phone ever since. No, hang on, it's all coming back to me now. It was during a big rebrand of the charity, and some literature about promoting wildlife in your garden was being rewritten. One of the changes was to include dimensions using tea bags as the basic unit of measurement. I. Jest. You. Not. However, back to the tasty infusions that would likely appeal to a bunch of tea-total birders: Nightjardeeling - ok this is a contrived spoonerism, but at least it is a teaspoon-erism. As ...