After all change here in North East Essex, like elsewhere of course, suddenly it is Spring. My vegetable seedlings, erstwhile stunted, have spurted into growth and there is great activity all around this place, especially in the bird world. All dashing about some with offspring in tow others rushing into partnerships. We were especially pleased to observe Blue Tits back and forth to a nest box sited near to our back door, but even better, this can be kept under close surveillance from a comfortable armchair in our lounge. And that has proved very interesting allowing us to watch the interaction between the parents as they bring in, glad to say, an apparent abundance of invertebrate food. The fare to sustain perhaps eight or more offspring seems of a wide variety. I am sure this included worms, and various grubs and caterpillars and one brought in a butterfly. There seems to exist a measure of entry discipline being observed by the adults - sometimes when one bird is already in the box the other returning partner appears to either wait on the external perch or due to some form of communication will fly off to a nearby bush until his mate exits and then immediately home in to deliver his or her contribution. On a couple of occasions have noticed a bird perched waiting to enter the nest will flutter its wings and assume this too may be some form of communication.
Whatever, it has given us great pleasure after such a poor start to this important season, that nature is taking every advantage of these equable conditions. For most of this week shade temperatures have been wonderfully normal, as once more the climate appears in, what, just over a five days to have stood on its head!
I look at and admire others forum pictures. I too try to take photos of natural history objects and scenes and maybe I could include the occasional image if some comment needs an illustration. I looked at the advice over inserting such, but tried to send a picture when I talked about astronomy, but somehow did not achieve. Maybe I need a bit of help here and so can some kind person advise. You can email me using michael.daniels1@tesco.net - thanks in anticipation.