Birds just confuse you...

As I walked directly across the parkland in front of the house, I was delighted to spend a good few minutes watching a kestrel fly and hover, a pattern it repeated as I wandered down the gentle slope. With the light behind me, although quite dull, I was able to enjoy the colouring as it did what kestrels do best. There was nothing there for it to drop on to, so it meandered away over the trees of Ivas wood.

It was a good start. A bird I knew and could observe. Ian was away and so I was left alone, in terms of being able to find and identify the wild life. Not that that is our sole purpose, but one that I am able to indulge in more and more. I have ordered the pocket field guide and am at present reading Simon Barnes' How to Be a Bad Birdwatcher with growing reassurance that I do enjoy watching, nay, observing the creatures around me without recourse to knowing all the names, or creating a list.

A specific field guide to the parkland would be a useful document. A general field guide, even limited to the UK with hundreds of types of birds, many of which wouldn't go near this environment, is OK but there will be a lot of redundant pages filled with birds that I am never going to see here. No doubt it will be useful in other parts of Britain.

The day remained dull, but the birds, though not over visible, were noisy enough. I now recognise the sound of the nuthatch amongst the other tweets, whistles and twitters. But I need to look at them. My self discipline in this matter is tarnished with laziness and devoid of the necessary patience and self discipline. Ian has these requisite skills to watch birds; I need to develop them.

The log gatherers from last week have been busy. There are great pyramids, though strictly speaking, they are triangular prisms, of logs at the edge of the Shed Plantation. Next week they may well be all removed.

The rotunda still displays its new wooden skeleton dome. Soon, I hope to see the shine of new metal adorning the structure.
This view, though distant, is across a space that was once filled with water and, at whose banks, cattle could be romantically found. It is one of the many water features that the parkland had installed mainly by William Wentworth.
Not many visitors today, despite being the remainder of the school Easter break. The noise of children loosing energy in the adventure play ground was quite the dominant sound nearer the house as I made my way back to base.