On 10/5/08 08:54, in article ,
"Martin" wrote:

snip

We have lots of rhubarb, but are running short of instant custard.
This morning I heard a cuckoo for the first time this year and finally we have
got swallows. Two wood pigeons are doing disgusting things in the trees at
dawn.
The green parakeet is a regular visitor.
Today it will be 26C again and there isn't a cloud in the sky.

I haven't heard a cuckoo in years, other than on Tresco but a friend says
she heard one in her village which is about 5 miles away. The wood pigeons
seems always to be doing something disgusting and the rooks are copying
them! We've seen a baby thrush looking rather surprised on what was
possibly its maiden flight and the first customer of the year has been in
grave distress at the plight of a baby blackbird 'because it can't fly'. A
lot of people seem not to know that blackbirds can't fly when they leave the
nest and so are prey to cats and other marauders, though I must say that our
blackbird numbers seem just fine. It's one of nature's great design faults!
We had a woodpecker on the peanut feeder a few days ago and usually it
visits some trees in a field over the lane.
Lovely sunny day here and everything is burgeoning wonderfully - the lanes
look wonderful and the fields of rapeseed are absolutely searing to the eyes
- very dramatic.

--
Sacha
http://www.hillhousenursery.co.uk
South Devon
'We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our
children.'