What have you seen

Very nice addition to your local list!

Great photo!

A touch of Autumn out at NT Barrington Court today. A nice area sown with annuals and the pumpkins ready to be lifted. 

Wonderful photos GL. We had never seen a bittern until a couple of years ago. We popped into Black Toft Sands reserve, ambled up to end hide, had just sat down with Binocs, and wow, three flew off together. Magical! We saw another first for us as well that holiday, a Spoonbill.

On a sadder note, we are deep in shooting country here, up on NY Moors. Literally thousands of bewildered, obviously very young pheasants all over the place. Driving the roads isn’t pleasant, hundreds dead for miles along the roads. You have to take it very steady to avoid them, and of course most folks don’t. Frankly it’s very depressing as they are lovely birds bred just to die. Lots of partridge and grouse as well, but these seem to survive better. At least on the roads. 😢

Strange things!

Our daughter found a couple of giant puffballs in a nearby field. (Football sized.) So now my OH has one all to himself, cooking bits of it in butter and garlic. He has rather a lot to get through! 

I saw part of a poem by John Clare at Minsmere RSPB reserve today and sought out the full version when I got back to the caravan. It was the reference to "bumbarrels"  and more importantly what their current name is that attracted me. See what you think.

I love to see the old heath’s withered brake
Mingle its crimpled leaves with furze and ling
While the old heron from the lonely lake
Starts slow and flaps his melancholly wing
And oddling crow in idle motion swing
On the half-rotten ash-tree’s topmost twig
Beside whose trunk the gipsey makes his bed
Up flies the bouncing woodcock from the brig
Where a black quagmire quakes beneath the tread
The fieldfare chatter in the whistling thorn
And for the awe round fields and closen rove
And coy bumbarrels twenty in a drove
Flit down the hedgerows in the frozen plain
And hang on little twigs and start again

A beautiful Kingfisher from the Barle river bridge in Dulverton. Such a lovely surprise.

Lots of newly released Pheasants around Dulverton too, 3 adopted us on the CMC site.Sat watching us while we drank our tea. Fed them with suet pellets.Poor things bred to be shot, such a cruel waste.

Had to look it up, WN, but did you know that there are lots more names for the same bird :-

Hedge Mumruffin, Jack-in-a-bottle, Bum Towel , Prinpriddle, Feather Poke, Long-tailed Mag and Millithrum (Miller’s Thumb)

Ref. Somerset Wildlife Trust.

We looked them up as well as we had no idea. Rather like Hedge Mumruffin.

Lovely bit of verse Wherenext, I guessed what they might be, they are flocking through our garden on a daily basis just now. These old words have a special ring to them. 

Nice to see a Kingfisher on the Barle, Rayjsj, haven't seen our local one for a long time but they are around I'm told.