Sight and sound of a blackcap

I should have mentioned this last week but better late than never I suppose. Last Wednesday morning we first heard and then as confirmation saw a blackcap. About a mile from here there is a little sheltered dell containing a small cluster of houses with plenty of bushes and trees around, just the right habitat for garden birds I guess, and it was here that the blackcap was producing its fluty notes. I understand that some blackcaps do overwinter in the south west and this sighting was a real pleasure.

It's been noticeable that a few birds are singing now. We are lucky here that signs of Spring start early.

Early start for blackbirds

I have commented before about the pleasure one can get from listening from birdsong and some species start singing before dawn. One such is the blackbird. Sometimes I awake early, today being an example and a blackbird started its melody at 4.26! This is nothing unusual at this time of year but it seems as if the song is a little gentler, not quite so penetrating as before.


Now I've always understood that birds tend to sing in spring when they are establishing territories and attracting mates. But I guess that the whole question of why they do it is more complex. Do some birds also sing for pleasure? Not for the first time I am amazed at the sheer variety of sounds different bird species produce from what one would imagine are physically similar voice boxes.

Still on the subject of our feathered friends I had the pleasure of seeing not just one but four kingfishers flying one after the other down by our river bank the other day. What a moment that was!

Night changing to day

I stepped out of my cottage at twenty past seven this morning to walk up to the paper shop. On opening the door not only did I hear a joyful dawn chorus but intermingled with that sound were the last gentle hoots from the tawny owls in the woods across the valley. Because of the relatively slow transition from night to day this overlapping of bird calls is a regular feature here.

It was certainly interesting, though expected, to experience the much quicker changes between dark and light in the Canaries when I went there. But I prefer that slow easing into daylight and the long twilight that we enjoy in these more temperate latitudes. However I wouldn't relish the much shorter winter days up in the north of Scotland. Overall the west country is the best although if I'm really fussy a little more winter sunshine wouldn't go amiss. How lucky I am to live here!

Thrushes undeterred by the weather

After a much brighter day yesterday the weather has once again reverted to its familiar wet and windy self. But whatever the weather the song thrush I can hear whilst typing this is undeterred in his singing and has in fact been singing for many days now. I am a huge lover of nature even though I can't claim to be a wildlife expert and one thing that really blows my mind is the incredible variety of birdsong and calls. The anatomical structure of different bird species seems to follow broadly similar lines and I would have thought that their voice boxes would have shown little variation. Yet, fortunately for us, their songs display remarkable variety. I'm told that if you had a chiffchaff in one hand and a willow warbler in the other an expert would be hard pressed to separate the two yet their songs could not be more dissimilar!

We can easily get blase about nature but its abundance and variety continues to leave me spellbound!