Home thoughts

Blackbird

It was a bright and sunny morning and I was woken up by a bird singing in the sycamores on the railway embankment. That's not a blackcap, I told myself, nor a robin. Then it upped the tempo and got a minutes' worth of song done in ten seconds, a typical garden warbler trick. I hope it stays round. A couple of years ago one set up territory here and was a regular source of confusion in the dawn chorus. Last year it was passing strangers that didn't linger.

The robin sang a few minutes later and his warm up reminded me why I'm always wary of very short bursts of song, the first couple of seconds could just as easily have been blackcap as robin. It was good to hear him, he's a bit quiet lately limiting himself to a quick burst of song a couple of times a day just to remind any others that he's there. I think I've heard the robin at the station twice in a fortnight.

It's only half-past April and the mayflowers are nearly over and the runny nose and itchy eyes season has come early. The spadgers are flitting in and out of the garden in twos and threes, the females barely stopping before zipping back again. I usually have a bit of a lull on the feeders this time of year, just enough to tide the birds over while the aphid numbers build up, but I think I'll need to prepare for an early arrival of an explosion of baby spadgers.

By mid-morning the clouds had rolled in and the strong wind had a cold edge to it. I didn't feel inclined to have a day out and I was even more disinclined to go mudlarking so I decided to take a rest. Next door had someone in to trim the tops of the sycamores at the bottom of the garden, a couple of hours' work that looked hair-raising at times but they've done a good job of it. I should have had the ones at the end of my garden topped this Winter, and the conifer, too, but didn't get round to it. It'll have to wait until Autumn now, there's a blackbird nest and a wren's nest in the ivies at the base of the tree and I suspect something's got a nest in the conifer but I haven't been able to whittle down the suspects. I know it's not the squirrels though I've no idea where they're camping out this year. When I've seen them at all lately they've always been coming in stage left but I haven't spotted any likely dreys.

The back garden.
The roses are full of buds and may beat the rowan tree into flower.

By lunchtime I was fidgety and went to do the week's shopping. There was a midday chorus at the station: blackbird, blackcap, great tits and wren. One of the jackdaws checked its chimney nest, the spadgers were vocal under platform two and pairs of magpies were in and out of the conifers like fiddlers' elbows. Because the train was late I had to do the shop in eleven minutes flat (a new personal best) so I didn't register any of the birdlife at Urmston Station.

I got home in the rain. Not for the first time it occurred to me that the weather presenters on local television programmes would do better to provide a bit more information about the forecast and a bit less trying to convince us that they are a character.