Wednesday 12 January 2011

A walk with the senses

Walking with Imogen to school this morning and then returning home, the air was filled with the most beautiful birdsong.

Without a camera in my hand, I paused in the woodland to see whether I could identify what I could hear, helped by spotting a few of our beautiful British birds. How lovely to just use my senses, and my improved identification skills of birds since I have a very inquisitive daughter. For many years (years ago) I wanted to be able to identify more things in the natural world - birds, trees, etc and the passion was re-ignited as Imogen grew and asked lots of questions. We have learned together.

So today, what did I see and hear.
  • The usual gulls flying inland no doubt as the weather is about to turn out at sea - strong winds and heavy rainfall forecast later.
  • Robins and Song Thrush who regularly visit our garden too.
  • Bullfinch - beautiful song, but it was the colour of the male that helped me recognise it, red/pink body with the black cap head.
  • Pied wagtails - one of Imogen's favourite birds to spot
  • Green Woodpecker, always lovely to hear them in the woods, they seem to be quiet through Winter so I think of Spring approaching when I hear them.
  • Fieldfare - I remember trying to photograph these last Spring without much luck, lovely to see them return again - a large group of them on the ground finding food.
  • Sparrows, wrens, blackbirds, blue tits ... all beautiful
It was amazing to see and hear so many just by pausing there for a short time.

The one I couldn't recognise and had to check on the RSPB site to identify was a beautiful bird feasting on some berries - a reddish brown colour with a crest ... I had no idea what it was but have now identified it as a Waxwing - a visitor to these shores in the Winter. Beautiful bird, just wish I'd had my camera ... maybe there will be another opportunity as it was on the hedgerow for ages, so would have hopefully got a great picture.

Wonderful sights and sounds, what have you seen and heard this morning?

5 comments:

  1. Lovely lovely post Dawn. Very grey and misty here today but we heard the Robin and blackbird in the garden. The birds are singing a wee bit more now, and despite the mist, the light stayed much longer today. xx

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  2. I saw a waxwing in our silver birch tree on Christmas morning, the first time I've seen one. I'm afraid I'm not very good at identifying birdsong though.

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  3. Lovely post, isn't it nice that this short snatches in the day can bring something wonderful too. Our walk/bus ride to school is mostly through grey buildings :-( But we have loads of bird visitors to the garden and often sit during breakfast watching them at the bird feeder and hearing them sing :-D

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  4. i really want to try to learn to identify birds from thier bird song

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  5. The singing is quite something at the moment isn't. We watched a couple of dunnocks serenading each other this morning, along with a Robin singing to it's hearts content.

    Sophie likes me to try and mimic the birds, bet we look a right sight!

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