Curlew & Hare

Hello dear reader, have you missed me? Oh you had not noticed I had gone.

Well as I have been busy, I just have not had the time to put much up here. Also there have been some changes in my life that meant I was not inclined to say much here, as I just did not want to bore folks.

Anyway, a few wildlife observations, a few weeks ago when it was really cold here, snow and all that, there was a rather large flock of Goldfinches about. I would estimate about fifty plus feeding on some Teasel that grows in the corner of one field close to the village. Also during the cold winter weather I was regularly seeing a couple of Grey Shrike. This was a life bird observation, so I was pleased to see them. As my cameras have both died, no pictures for the moment and as soon as I can afford to get a new camera... Well who knows what images may turn up here.

It was the observations that I made this last week that tells me that spring is coming. Although with another cold snap just hit, that seems longer away than it did on Thursday. When I saw the first Skylark making its courtship flight. It was a male and they sing while flying, rising from the ground and singing while in flight for a good minute at a time. The next observation made just ten minutes latter was of a Curlew. I had heard it while I had watched the Skylark but no matter how hard I scanned I could not see him. Then as I walked nearer the crest of the hill before entering my village, he flew across the road just fifteen feet ahead of me. He was going to a patch of land where a farmer had been keeping some manure and now cleared is clearly a good spot for them to feed.

However I have also been watching the Brown Hares. While I have seen hares before, it has only since I have moved here that I have seen them as frequently and in greater numbers than I have ever seen them. Also many of the observations have been closer than I have seen before too. Although I have had to learn how to observe them without them seeing me and going to ground. I can see where the folk legends of them being mystical and magical creatures arise, as one minute you can see them then in the blink of an eye they are gone, disappeared. They huddle in scrapes in the ground so they literally do disappear. While trying to watch a female hare recently, I came across a Lapwings nest. While there were no eggs in it yet, he or she was so settled that it was not until I was seven or eight feet from the bird that it took flight.

There have been times when it appeared that the local landscape was barren of wildlife, but it is there it just hugs the ground so tightly that mostly it goes unobserved.