Flights

There is rain moving down the valley, but the skies here are still clear and the woods are full of birdsong. I have never been able to distinguish one bird from another simply by its song; urban birdwatching is more a question of what-can-you-see. But here, or anywhere with a greater sense of space, there is the opportunity to see more of the birds' life and hopefully to identify perhaps by sound alone. Over the winter we had some astonishing birds coming to our feeders. Great Spotted Woodpeckers, Nuthatches, Siskins, Long-tailed Tits (they are still here), Greenfinches, and Marsh or Willow Tits; far too similar for my eyes yet. We also had more common birds such as Blackbirds, Chaffinches, Blue and Great Tits, and Tree or Hedge Sparrows; again, my eyes cannot yet distinguish them. We also have Dunnocks, small beautiful birds like grated nutmeg, a pattern of browns and greys. In the lane we have had Bullfinches and Treecreepers, and there are many owls here. I cannot identify by sound alone, but I think we have had Tawny Owls in the woods and Barn Owls over the fields, which I think is about right. And on the walk yesterday I saw a pair of Wheatears, strangely desert birds of pale yellows and dark browns, perfectly camouflaged against the blond ground and stubble.

There are at least eight or nine buzzards living on the hill above us; we have seen all of them at once, an incredible sight. There are also Ravens at the top of the hill; I have a Raven amulet from Canada, which gives them a poetic dark jesting character in my eyes, as if the Raven is a Loki bird, undermining and scheming. And there are flocks of Rooks, strange black flaps of birds which fling themselves across the road. We see them everywhere here, as wooded country with open fields is I believe ideal for them. I tried to draw them, these patches of darkness, but I have not drawn since childhood and my work was clumsy and childish. Mark Cocker's book 'Crow Country' made me see them in a new light, their endless patterns of roosting and feeding; I read the book because of the amount of Rooks here, but the book made me aware of roosts and rookeries as well, and their vague unrecorded history.