Happy New Year! What a fantastic start to the year. All those wonderful childhood dreams of a white Christmas coming true. And how the snow changes the way we view our environment and our interaction with it. As you may have gathered by now, I am an avid birdwatcher (not a twitcher, I hasten to add).
My grandfather was the most wonderful man called David Wolfe Murray: he painted under the name of Fishhawk and was a gentle giant of a man (at least in my memory!). He first taught me to fish and cast a line. And he loved the call of geese flighting across the evening sky; a sound that has always held a deep personal meaning for me. It was 'Grandad' who first caught my interest in the small garden birds and the importance of feeding them and providing them with water. I will never forget feeding his tame robin with mealy grubs; the first time a small bird perches on your hand is, I think, indelibly etched into one's memory. They are so fragile, so light and so wild. Grandad's back garden looked like Fort Knox to marauding cats. It had wire and netting all around it, but inside it was a haven. Blackbirds, robins, dunnocks and tits all nested safely there and raised their young. Grandad would sit in his studio with a catalpault at his side, and between painting, would keep a beady eye out for any cat foolish enough to consider entering his back garden. They never did it twice. Which brings me to the subject in hand.
My kitchen looks out across a piece of lawn to a stumpery replete with ferns, hellebores, moss and a resident short-tailed vole. And around this heap of stumps there is a mass of leaves, left over from autumn. They were supposed to have been cleared up and put on the compost heap, but I am so glad that they have been left. The activity over the last few days, even with the snow, has been frenetic. The leaves have obviously acted as a refuge for all sorts of insects which the birds have had a field day enjoying. I am determined to leave part of my garden particularly the shrubbery border to overwinter au naturel so that all insects and bugs can do what they will. That way I will have birds to watch throughout the winter months (although I do not need a catapault – our Jack Russells keep unwary cats at arms length!).
