Hello again, it’s good to be back.
Well we’ve enjoyed some lovely late summer and autumn weather since my last notes. I can’t remember getting as much sunshine in autumn before. This encouraged the plants to continue flowering very late and we saw butterflies galore. I think the two most common are the most beautiful, i.e. peacocks and red admirals.
In our garden we have enjoyed lots of visits from “Woody”, our greater spotted woodpecker, whose lovely colours sparkle in the sunshine. One day, a male greenfinch came, still in his super bright green, with the yellow stripe. Greenfinches are much less common these days. The recent cooler weather has brought posses of long tailed tits into the garden. They leave as soon as they arrive, but it’s great to see them.
On 7th November, Andrew told me he had seen some fieldfares. These are the winter thrushes which come to us from Scandinavia and Russia. I too saw my first ones yesterday—a huge flock of them heading towards Angus’ orchard, where they roost for the night.
Alan Jones (841671)