Hello and a Merry Christmas to you all!
Lots of activity in the garden. On the feeders – lots of goldfinches (goldies), blue tits, great tits, long tailed tits, coal tits (more of them this winter), greenfinches, chaffinches and 
our friend “Woody”, the great spotted woodpecker, who visits us most days.
On my walks up the lane towards Willands Ash, I often see a sparrow hawk. He (she) sits on top of the posts, and is getting very bold, because she doesn’t fly away until the last 
moment. The buzzards are also about – one hears them before seeing them – mewing like cats.
Leonard tells me that we have got a rare visitor near Yellingham. A cattle egret. This is a smaller, dumpier bird than the little egrets, which are now common in the UK. We’ve seen a solitary cattle egret in previous years in that 
area of the Parish.
I was hoping to have been on the River Exe birdwatching cruise by now, which, unfortunately, we had to cancel because of the bad weather forecast, which, in the event, was wrong, so we could have gone! I do recommend this trip to anyone with an interest in birds – it is excellent.
Alan Jones – 841671
