Well, obviously it’s that time of year, and so all the local animals have paired off, and started producing offspring.  We have been denied the delights this year of having the Lapwing nursery close to the brewery, but they aren’t far away.  Their presence is given away by the fact the adults permanently seem to patrol the skies to defend the chicks from aerial predators, of which of course we have several.  They seemingly know no fear, as this year we are getting very regular visits from a Red Kite, who may well be resident nearby.  This is of course nice, unless you happen to be a potential meal, and as the Lapwings are in the latter category, they are keen to scare it away as quickly as possible.  This on top of dealing with numerous Buzzards, more Crows than you could stone without getting RSI, several rooks, a Kestrel or two, Sparrowhawks, Hobbies, and, if reports are to be believed, a Harrier of the Montagu variety.  Now before anyone starts twitching, we’ve not seen it, and even if one is knocking about, it is almost certainly on passage to somewhere else, has probably already gone, and may not have even existed in the first place.  That said, they aren’t unheard of up here.

As a rank amateur at bird spotting (oh look, there’s a bird…), it gets very hard defining what you have seen.  So when I saw a Merlin (for the second time this year) earlier this week disrupting the Goldfinches who were seemingly arguing with the Sparrows over whose turn it was to use the pond, I was somewhat surprised to read later that by now, all Merlins are by now in the North of England, mating on the moors.  So therefore it was not a Merlin, but something else.  An aggressive thrush perhaps?  A Jackdaw going to a fancy dress party maybe (they do that a lot apparently).  It could even have been a pantomime Merlin, with a couple of sparrows inside.  Truth is, I’ll never know – I am no expert, so I could be very wrong.  But it looked like a Merlin, darted about like a Merlin, chasing birds like a Merlin does.  It was even Merlin sized, although the tell-tale pointy hat, flowing white beard and knobbly staff weren’t obvious from my viewpoint.

So today, standing outside feeling smug having just finished brewing ‘Iron Duke’, I became fascinated by a Lapwing flying around close by in an agitated manner.  Joining in this agitation was a very vocal Starling, a stressed Goldfinch or three, and a mildly disturbed Blackbird.  There was obviously a predator about, and they focus of concern seemed to be a section of established (ie unkempt) hedgerow that we know supports a number of nests.  After a minute or two of study, a sparrowhawk flapped out of the hedge at a low level, and almost instantly went back in again further down.  Much consternation ensued, and even the Reed Buntings popped out to get a good view.  This was repeated a couple more time before it went out of site, and so I returned to watching the Sparrows debate with the Corn Buntings whose turn it was to wobble around on the reedy-looking plants on the edge of the pond.  Meanwhile, the pigeons started their regular evening races round the barns, the blackbirds went back to nervously looking at the grass in case a worm was feeling suicidal, and the Wagtails resumed gobbing-off for no apparent reason of the roof of our beer cellar.  Life was returning to normal.  Even the Yellowhammers came to say hello, which was nice…