It looked like a bright sunny when I set off on my walk this morning. I try to cover the area around Falcon Cottage north to the sea as frequently as tours and other work allows. I like to see what’s happening on ‘my patch’. Bird migration should be hot right now in mid October but in fact it’s as slow as I’ve known it for many years. Good birds tend to be turning up in Essex and around the Borders of Scotland but seem to be missing Norfolk … for the moment – there’s still time for that to change but it suffices to say it’s a bit quiet.
With an unpromising steady south westerly wind blowing I set off with no air of expectation just a mild healthy curiosity. I was right; finding birds was hard work. As a good friend of mine said over the weekend Woodpigeon Retina burn-out! It came as some surprise then that from one small copse the familiar sound of a calling Yellow browed Warbler punctuated the silence and a rather out of place Great spotted Woodpecker coming in off the sea led me to take a second take as it landed on one of the wooden groynes!
As I climbed back up the ridge towards home the wind got up and the sky turned that gun metal grey that signals rain. It wasn’t long before it started; not heavy forceful rain you understand, just gentle drizzle. Then it all started to happen.
Skylarks in abundance, Song Thrushes, Redwings, Chaffinch by the score and a party of House Martins dashed through – the first I’ve seen for a couple of weeks. Despite the south westerly, migration was happening and the rain was pushing things down low.
As I got back to Falcon Cottage and closed the gate behind me I heard a ‘crest’ in the garden. Not the thin call of a Goldcrest but the round fruity call of a Firecrest and with a little patience there it was, feeding among the ivy on the leeside of trees. I watched it as it danced through the branches and leaped over the bushes to a Holm Oak in the far hedgerow. I never tire of seeing these tiny flying jewels. From here it left the garden and it was away. I turned to enter the house only to be faced with another feeding in the ivy by the door. Two Firecrests!
As Sharon said … nice garden tick!
Letter From Norfolk 