Whiffled

Has you ever been whiffled by a horse? Well, that is to say, breathed with and snuffled quite warmly, gently and noisily. It was very new to me. As was I to the horse, a young rescue who still won't be ridden because of the way he was introduced to the idea.
But his rescue owner said he would be fine. And he was. And it was me that was all giggly and nervous. But there. Now I have shared breaths with a horse.

Streaming Komische Oper Berlin's "The Fair at Sorochintsi" by Moussorgsky

Muggy late summer weather. Out in the garden, hanging me washing, besieged by swallows swoopin' and chatterin'. Why flying so low? Flying ants, that's why, and the birds was swooping in for a meal of fat queen ants on the wing.

But sometimes this weather gives me a right old headache, or the feeling of the start of one. This happened the other weekend and I took to me workroom, feeling sorry for myself, unable to read and nothing on the radio... until I do have a brain wave and try the internet and the Opera Platform.  And I found a piece from the Komische Oper Berlin (same director, Barry Kosky, that brought "The Nose" to Royal Opera House).

Dear friends I spent a pleasant couple of hours, forgetting my headache and lounging around to the streamed pleasure of  Moussorgsky's "The Fair at Sorochintsi" Berlin style: farce, love story, devils and curses, drama, pigs heads and stilt-walkers. And great chorus singing. My kind of opera production.
You can stream it from Opera Platform until 21st October 2017 and I suggest you do.

Cornish Interlude

First sight of swallows.
The Old Man and me do drive away to eat pasties and drink tea on Goonhilly Downs. Blackthorn is blossoming, foot high willows at the side of the path have bright yellow "pussy willow" catkins, tiny sedges flower. We do walk along and I hear the skylarks - and see one - singing and singing in the sky. Then two swallows dip and scoop over the dry grass, pools and heath. The gorse is so yellow and lush this year and for the first time I do smell it... coconut. Gorse flowers smell of coconut.

The other day... we walk down to the coast at Rinsey. The lane is narrow. Again, blackthorn and bright deep-yellow gorse in the hedges. And with them - the pale yellow-green of flowering alexanders. They look so good together. And the whole lane smells of honey from the alexanders.

Avian Murder: Survivor

I told you, in the previous post, the brutal story of infanticide carried out by a house sparrow upon a great tit nestling. And that we were left not knowing if any siblings had survived.

Well. The parent birds did not leave the area. They were still feeding something, somewhere. We became convinced that at least one chick was out of the nest-hole and somewhere in the yard. We began to hear the piping sounds of a tit chick. Thought perhaps - two, but to this day still do not know for sure.
A day or so after the killing of the first great tit nestling, I was watering the garden when I became aware that I was staring at a very young tit-chick, gape-beaked, unkempt, staring back at me from the concrete surround of a drain hole near the bushy undergrowth of a partly collapsed clematis. (That kind of garden). One survivor. I kept telling it to get under cover but it didn't listen.

Next day. And a strikingly similar baby bird was some five metres away in the herbage bordering our broken down decking. (That kind of garden.) Always the great tit adults were hunting food, dropping down to feed it and keeping close watch. Later that day there was no baby on the decking but I think I heard tit-piping from the hawthorn trees above.

So. We think at least one baby bird survived and flew. Not the nest exactly... but life on the streets so to speak. I am marveling at the vigilance and tough determination of its parents who must have got the nestling out of the nesting-hole somehow and, across several days, got it to travel some seven metres or so, still feeding, defending and moving it whenever they knew it had been spotted (by us.) And let me say, that chick must have had some stubborn, brave streak too.

But what seemed very odd to me, in retrospect, was that the sparrows gave up interest once the nest was emptied. They didn't pursue the survivor (or possibly - survivors) even though they were still hiding in the same yard. The sparrows wanted them out of that nest-hole in "their" territory at all costs. Finito.

Does this story ring a bell? Seems like it's a cruel, natural urge.
Survival tale.

Avian Murder In The Courtyard

It was a mystery. And the culprit was someone whom I least expected. The victim was a great tit chick. Almost fledged but found - by me - on the yard floor below the hole in the wall that is a great tit's nest. The crown of its head was bald of feathers and skin, clearly this was not a natural death.
I removed the little corpse and buried it, feeling sad because we had been watching the progress of the great tit family as much as we could and were waiting the fledging of the chicks. I tried to work out if the culprit could have been a rat. But if so, why not carry away and eat its catch? As well, I knew the entrance hole was too small for the usual suspects... poor old magpie or various members of the crow family. Whoever it was had either been disturbed or left its victim as a cruel display.

And deep in my heart I knew the unbelievable truth. For I had seen the head of a male sparrow protruding from this nest hole shortly before I found the corpse. There are sparrows nesting, as well, in the house corners on both sides of the yard. After the death I spotted other sparrows taking great interest, one standing on the edge of the hole. I chased them off from the wall.

At least one of the parent great tits is still around. We are not sure if there are still two on duty. The Old Man reported seeing a great tit doing some kind of aggression display-dance at the sparrows in the yard but I do not know if there are surviving chicks in the nest. Whatever happened and whether any of the brood have survived, I am very sad to witness this cold-blooded murder perpetrated by a neighbour - one about whom I can never feel quite the same.

Springtime: The Bird That Wants To Make A Phone Call

It's definitely spring. The Old Man and I get in the car to go walking .. as you do. A short drive to Penrose Estate and cars are decanting children, dogs, and walkers with sticks. The car park is packed and The Old Man do attract some attention trying to park in the last slot. His frustration at the current car do infuriate and defeat him, causing some outraged stares at an accidental horn beep. We give up and turn round to leave for another car park in Helston, at the lower end of the "trail". That's when I realise that quite some of the sniggering walkers are marshaling their sticks, children and dogs to walk out onto the road again and not into the wooded estate. So it dawns on me that they are parking up here to walk down to Porthleven for the Food Festival (sorry folks, last day today) which by all accounts has been packed out this year

But we manage our walk along the Cober and the woods of Penrose Estate. The first thing I see when I get out of the car ...  are swallows flying above the river. In the woods themselves birds are singing fit to bust: robins, wrens, blackbirds, chiffchaffs. Something more melodious. Blackcap? And then a song I don't know, probably some kind of warbler. I heard once that if you are trying to remember a bird's song then concentrate on catching the rhythmn and make up a phrase that echoes the rhythmn. So I do.
Definitely it's: "I gotta make a phone call, brrrr, brrrr."

I rushed (or hobbled) home and do try out the thing on the internet, starting with warbler songs. Maybe a reed warbler? But I am not convinced. So if anyone knows which bird sings "I gotta make a phone call, brrrr, brrrr." - I'd like help with the answer.

Bit Of An Autumnal Break: Somerset

 ...and the village of my grandmother.... apparently.
Bit of an orchard. And plenty of mistletoe comin' for Christmas.

Come to speak of it.... mistletoe all over Somerset this year. The Old Man says he don't remember it ever being so .... "mistletoe-ish".

Autumn: The Robin Sings

I go up into the bedroom where the window is open to the autumn sun and hear the sound of a robin singing its soft autumn song in the hedge nearby.
I spot something on my chair. A tiny pile of bird .... waste. It do appear that the robin may have popped in for a call before he popped out again to sing so sweetly in the hedge.
Robins. Cheeky little beggars.

Hard-boiled Foraging: Doll-Style

Pick your sloes. Wash them, stab them with a needle... several times. Pack them in a jar. Pour some sugar on them. Drown them in gin. Let them "stew" so to speak, for quite some time.
Then come Christmas... throw the sloes away and drink the gin.

The Doll's Dander Is Up And She Do Agree: "Save Treloyhan Woods"

I have posted before about the pace of development in St Ives in Cornwall.... yes it may be nostalgia... but I really do think this is now beyond fond memories of the past.
I don't often write a post like this.... but an area close to my teenage-years heart is about to get the natural stuffing knocked out of it.
So I ask you to watch this film and consider contributing to the GoFundMe:Treloyhan Appeal against Cornwall Council's planning approval for 16 houses to be built in the wooded grounds of Treloyhan Manor owned by Methodist Guild Holidays Ltd. These woods form an important "green corridor" for St Ives/Carbis Bay and a stopping place and breeding ground for nationally rare bird species.
The campaign has launched a judicial appeal .... which costs money.

Jumping Pink Grasshoppers

Chorthippus parallelus (pink form)

Wildlife is being a bit wild at the moment. At the time I was hosting a fledgling sparrow in the bathroom.... I spotted a pink grasshopper on the granite hedge of the garden. See?

Apparently these are a variation of the Meadow Grasshopper. Though first I wondered if it had some kind of "chameleon" quality because it did blend so well with the pinkish leaves and stems of the surrounding campanula.
Maybe it just knew where to be.

The Guest In The Bathroom - Part 2

... All Monday my guest chirps in the bathroom. The weather is full-on Cornish mist but I keep the window wide open (for the parent and the fledgling) whilst worrying about pneumonia in fledglings and such like. I can see that my guest is being fed - a very small clump of bird-feeder seed and several legs that were once attached to a Harvestman litter the box. The guest itself is on the floor again. I put it back in the windowsill box and close the access door to the loft.

But my guest is a magician. After an hour or two, I take a look... I can see no birdie but there is chirping coming from the loft. Heaving a sigh, we remove the access door again. There is a flurry of wings but nothing to be seen in the gloom. Perhaps the adult is coming to feed its chick by the roof space? Hearing loud chirps later in the day, I go into the bathroom again. No baby bird to be seen, not on the floor, not in the box. I look up at the loft hatch and there.... is a gapey yellow beak pointing at me from the dark of the roof space. Chirp.
How did you get up there? Or... are you a fledging sibling? I give up and mop up some of the bird poop and harvestman legs.
As it grows dark I go up to close the window. All is quiet. No birdie to be seen. I guess it is sleeping wherever it is. Tuesday morning - all is the same. No chirps. No bird. Peace and quiet. A sense of "Gone".
I close the loft access and wonder at this last conjuring trick.
Then I mop up and gratefully run a bath.
Bye-Bye Birdie and good luck.

The Guest In The Bathroom

It is the second day since our guest took up residence in the bathroom.

We have had fledgling problems in the past and on Saturday morning... there are chirps behind the bathroom wall where chirps should not be heard. During the course of the day these chirps move upwards and grow louder. On Sunday morning I remove the ceiling trapdoor and cautiously stick my head through the access hole. I can see a yellow, gapey beak pointing at me in the gloom. I slowly lower myself back to the floor, open the window wide... and leave, closing the door behind me. Later in the day, I am indeed cheered by the sight of an adult sparrow flying out of the bathroom window. But the chirping goes on and grows louder. The Old Man thinks the bird is now in the bathroom itself. The day grows dark. I open the door. The fledgling is on the floor, next to the bath. I close the window against the dark (surely Parent Sparrow have gone to bed now?), collect my night dress... and leave.

All night long I suffer guilt about small sparrow in the cold, dark, bathroom corner. I feel sure he have died of cold and hunger. So this morning, as dawn strikes, I am relieved to hear the chirps start up again. I creep into the bathroom. Very small sparrow is in another corner... delicate spatters of poop are growing in number. I open the window wide, creep out again, closing the door and returning to my bed. The next time I look, on my way to breakfast, the baby bird (it has all its feathers but is still very yellow round the beak-corners) is in yet another corner of the room. And I realise that there is nowhere for it to drop down into flight. Flying will mean lift-off from the floor. Doubt if it can manage that. And does the Parent still come to it? A flurry of shocked wings behind me tells me that it does.

The Old Man comes up with a temporary solution. He finds his polystyrene propagating tray with its sawn-off end (don't ask... can't remember why). I put it onto the bathroom's deep windowsill, with a towel covering part of the unsawn-off end (shelter). Next I pick up the outraged fledgling and pop it into its new "nesting box", on the sill and by the open window. I sigh, gather my toothpaste and brush and leave the room again.

It be chirping loudly as I write. But I do wonder when I get a wash.

Mrs D's Hair Expresses Itself

Mrs D have surprised herself with a new hair product which have given her hair a strange new life of its own. She do get enraged by her hair and is obsessed with "product".
Meanwhile I am nursing a headache and staring at the Saturday Pizza dough while it do stare at me....
And The Old Man be hacking and coughing as he have been doing all week.

The Garden is full of Ringlets which is more than I can say for Mrs D's hair.

(With apologies... having some trouble with Chrome and Blogger....so have reloaded today's post....This is a strangely difficult day on my computer... some stars must be crossed.)

Jumping Jehosophats: Baby Grasshoppers

I am besieged. Every time I go in the sun room I do find babies. Baby grasshoppers. In truth they are smaller than this here one. The replicating of the little critters in scale was beyond Mrs D's skills. (What isn't, really.) But I have developed an eye for them and so far over the past week I reckon to have rescued about 18 from the wall or floor and tried to place them outside and somewhere more appropriate.

"First instar." Pronounces The Old Man loftily... and returns to his newspaper, whilst I do crawl around sayin' "Here baby baby... come to Mama..." Can you imagine that? Me... as a great big Mama grasshopper? Oh but my jaws would be head-crunchers.

I think "real mama" must have hopped in and laid eggs under the skirting or something last autumn... and now tis spring... and the babies be hatching.
How big are they really? Well imagine chasing jumping caraway seeds and you get the idea.

Walking By Copperhouse Pool

Shaken by our morning visit to my old "home town" the other day (previous post). We accelerated away from it all and drove into Hayle, another town being "revitalised". A huge new Asda store removes our bearings... but at least the powers-that-be are repairing the rail viaduct that crosses a main square and has looked ominous for some time.
We find Philps for a pasty each and drive sedately along King George V Memorial Walk, parking up at the other end in a small space still available... for now.

The estuary tide in Copperhouse Pool is low.... a lot of mud... which means waders. On the way I spot shelduck. Out of the car we start to walk back along the Memorial Walk. First up is a flock of lapwings quietly settled on the flats. I see the elegant titfer crests and hear the occasional pipe. Now and then one rises up with that floppy-winged flight... broad ended wings.


My favourite comes a bit further along in the walk... The big guy with his down-curved beak. The curlew. And yes.... he do call as he comes in to land. I love that sound.
Elsewhere.... Redshank, Greenshank, Wigeon.... And lots of dogs chasing balls and stuff. Can hear a thrush.
Wuff.... Just what I need after the grim concrete of Carbis Bay.

PS. Hello friend looking to return to Cornwall.... I take back what I said about Hayle.... for now.

Those Caterpillars

You know that Elephant Hawk-Moth caterpillar The Old Man do find on the path the other day?
Well he's getting good at this. Just found a fifth. On a path. Sometimes at the front of the house. Sometimes at the back. Five, I tell you.
Or else the same one be going round and round the house.

The Old Man Finds A Caterpillar

"I found a big caterpillar... I found a big caterpillar..."
"Where?"
"....I found a big caterpillar..."
"Where?"
"Here... Look."
"Whe-e-ere!"
"Outside the kitchen door..... Look..."



My word it be a big boy... sat there... disconsolate on the weedy concrete yard.
I can see a "face" at the front end - almost like a lizard's face. This is apparently what gives it's final moth phase its name of the Elephant Hawk-Moth.... not because of the size of the moth (silly me) but for this "snout" at the front.
Rightly or wrongly we do carry it away from the concrete (so ready to be stood on) and put it into the leaf-litterish undergrowth round the front hoping it would find a handy place to pupate.
Read the Guardian article by another man surprised in the undergrowth.

The View From St. Agnes Beacon

The other day... a break for freedom away from the house with a trip over to St. Agnes Beacon, a landmark hill over on the North coast of Cornwall near the village of St. Agnes.
Heather, butterflies, bees, and a blue dragonfly the size of a small helicopter buzzing a puddle near the top. It be lovely there. Back to the car for the necessary pasty.

This view is from near the top... looking eastwards along the coast towards Perranporth and Newquay.

By Heck... A Fledgling Where It Shouldn't Be... (Episode Two)

Having established that a baby sparrow have somehow got itself into the tube of our extractor fan... and be shouting out to the world through the outlet grille .... (see yesterday's post)...
The Old Man and me do decide there is nothing for it but to try to release it from inside the house. There have been many a tradesman who do nearly come to blows with The Old Man over his insistence that things be done a certain way. And in this case he insisted that we be able to get at the extractor fan outlet, which is hidden by a cupboard, rather than being walled in.

And so it be that I do empty everything including a kitchen sink .... (well, no, not quite)... from said cupboard and The Old Man sets about unscrewing its backboards. Next, he removes the insulation... (paff... pthah... archoo!) .... which do leave us staring at a coil of extractor hose running up from the floor below. Slowly The Old Man disconnects the hose from its solid junction and I hurriedly fix some paper over the junction pipe ... else all will be lost if the fledgling plummets downwards. Finally, we do peer into the hose and see for ourselves the feathered bum of a small bird standing on the bend before the grille.

Well, I do try a small box held underneath the end of the coil... a bit of judicious wiggling and shaking. No good. A careful hand creeping up the pipe... just causes the bird to shuffle out of reach towards the grille. In the end we cover what gaps and remaining insulation we can....and carefully close the cupboard door.

I am scratching me head wondering what to do next, when The Old Man shouts that the chirping is now very LOUD. We carefully open the cupboard door... and there on the floor is a small but perfectly formed sparrow.

Long story shortened... I do manage to catch it and decide that The Old Man's advice to put it out of the window onto the roof is perhaps not the thing to do. I go downstairs and into the yard and put it into the thick shrubby clematis that covers the house wall under the nest boxes. The little thing do immediately plummet into the shrubbery under the clematis stems. But tis the best I can do. The clematis heaves with sparrows on occasion and I think it must form a landing platform for the the fledglings who manage a more orthodox entry into the big wide world.

Oh. Yes. How did it get into the pipe in the first place? It must have bounced along the top of the house wall as far as the hose... where The Old Man do spot that something have made a nice raggedy hole. Some years ago we did have a slight mouse problem....

And, yes, 36 hours later, there still be healthy chirping from the shrubbery and an adult bird in attendance.... so we live in hopes we did the best we could.
Next step... a new hose perhaps.