Spring

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Hen-Gen

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Island of Fetlar, Shetland Islands
Awoke this morning to wall to wall sunshine and not a breath of wind. And my first ewe had lambed, twin boys. Twenty three, three week old chicks happy in their shed. My co- owned Galloway cattle all healthy and contented. Alls well with the world. But I daren't leave the ewes because the birds are bad this year. Virtually everyone else has found newborn lambs with their eyes and tongues pecked out and in one case even a ewe savaged as it was giving birth. It's a joy having no foxes but the big three avian killers are fierce. (that's Great Skuas, Greater Black Backed Gulls and Ravens).
And my nearest and dearest 500 miles south working. Ho hum.
 
Woke this morning to lashing rain, strong wind, and 5C. so glad someone has good weather.
Skuas and the bigger gulls are evil, no Ravens in this part of the world, although a pair did arrive and breed on a pylon along the Thames last year successfully and have young again this year so only a matter of time before they are plentiful around here
 
I'm somewhere between the two - 5C, strong wind and intermittent sunshine. It's unusual for the east coast to get lasing rain while we're nice and dry 8-)
 
Well given I am probably the most southerly of us, I am not having the best of weather! Its been a typical April - ie very variable from low 20s down to about 10, but lots of wind and 2-3 times the usual amount of rain. Today was sunny, then cloudy and now its trying to rain and we will be having a fire lit for the third time in 3 days.

On the subject of bad birds, I am not aware of any here, but then again there isn't much livestock, just the occasional couple/flock of goats. However, it was very warm earlier this week, and I was sitting quietly reading when a hoopoe came down and landed about 6 foot from me. They are common birds, but rarely do they spend much time close up and on the ground. I don't think he/she saw me, but I could see the crest very clearly, and the length/hookedness of the bill, although its quite fine as he/she poked about looking for food. I could imagine them as a wader and I hope they are not malicious. They are going about in pairs at the moment, this one looked relatively young as it was quite slender.
 
OH will be very jealous when I tell her. She loves to see a Hoopoe over here. She longs to find one on her local recording patches. There have been a few come across here this spring. Even I think they are stunning. We were in Norfolk in January at a well known raptor watching spot when we heard one everyone's head span round, it was someones phone tune !
 
I know what you mean! They are quite stunning and I like them because they are an easy spot!

I have just read/listened to something on the BBC iplayer which says that Spring is, on average, 26 days earlier than a decade ago. I know Spring/Autumn do seem to be starting earlier, but 26 days? I just don't believe it, at this rate Spring will start before the New Year and still in my lifetime! The gist of the clip was that detailed records are being kept with help from the public for the past 20 years, and there is lots of more random info gathered from years before.
 
Quite cold here today with the temperature down from 28C a week ago to 13C and a chilly West wind, so it doesn't feel like Spring at all. Forecast says 2C tonight which, because of our terrain, means we could well see a frost on the vegetable plot. Bad news that as the tomatoes are on their second truss, all the potatoes are just about to be earthed up and the squashes are well on the way. Fortunately we have plenty of fleece which strangely is all made in England but sells here for just a fraction of the price we used to pay when we lived there?

A pair of Hoopoe have arrived here this week- one flew against the patio doors, catching spiders I presume. Curiously the Cattle Egrets have started to return- but they've only been gone a couple of months so quite where they went to after riding out the Winter here I don't know?
 
Had a frost last night (Monday) Grass still white at 8 am. Warmed up during the day but with a cold wind. Raining again now :(
 
MrsBiscuit said:
I know what you mean! They are quite stunning and I like them because they are an easy spot!

I have just read/listened to something on the BBC iplayer which says that Spring is, on average, 26 days earlier than a decade ago. I know Spring/Autumn do seem to be starting earlier, but 26 days? I just don't believe it, at this rate Spring will start before the New Year and still in my lifetime! The gist of the clip was that detailed records are being kept with help from the public for the past 20 years, and there is lots of more random info gathered from years before.
Click to expand...

Spring this year here is, they tell us, about a month behind. I'm looking at my apple trees thinking "Bloom, for pity's sake!!" It's just seemed like a long, endless Winter, since that "Ex Hurricane Ophelia" in, was it early October? Record amount of rainfall, major snowfall in March when we haven't had snow for 8 years, and it's still struggling to get to highs of 11C during the day. Some days it stays around 6 or 7. However, we are promised much warmer weather for over the weekend, so here's hoping! This morning is nice and bright, although it's a bit chilly.
 
Well it was a light frost only- down to 0C and now brilliant sunshine and 18C and rising. The snakes are waking up and sunbathing. The lizards are basking on the walls and the hornet and wasp queens are out- a major downside of living here. Last year we had a nest of Asian Hornets set in the wall after they killed off a black bee nest. Cost €150 to get rid of it- too dangerous to go near so we had to call a professional. We had two nests of European Hornets, which are harmless but can cause problems. One nested in the kitchen chimney and almost blocked it- took 2 days to open up the chimney and get the nest out. Not that serious, but they kept finding their way through the cooker extractor fan and flying around inside the house.

So this year we are following a French friend's recipe using plastic water bottles with a mix of beer, wine and strawberry syrup hanging every 10 metres around the house, 8 in all. So far we have caught a dozen- half European and half Asian, so if we hadn't used the traps we would have been in trouble later in the year. Lets hope we have caught them all.
 
Blackbirds have nested under the eaves of our front porch this year, just above the door. We've tried to come in and out quietly, as they fly off the nest when humans are around, but it's a good place, covered and dry, and shaded in hot weather (if any!) They've now hatched and we can see three little beaks poking up above the edge of the nest The parents go on feeding them now, even when we are around.

Massive amount of traffic on our feeders now the nesting season is moving towards hatching time. The sparrows seem to be living on fatballs (autocorrect had that as footballs!) and all the little birds are popping in and out of the kibbled peanut, the mixed seed, the sunflower seed, and the mealworm feeders. All of these have feeder guardians over them, as we were losing kilos of seed to a plague of wood pigeons, though luckily there are no squirrels here. We got to the stage where 9 or 10 woodpigeons were feeding on the lawn and queueing up for a go at the feeders, but they seem to have given up coming now they can't get in to the cages. So I can sprinkle a mug of mixed seed and mealworms in the morning for the blackbirds and other ground feeders who can't manage the cage feeders. There's the top of a little bit of wall which Poppy can't reach - she was hoovering up the mixed seed from the ground and producing very interesting studded poos, as the seeds went straight through. Some starlings do manage to get a nibble of the mealworms in the feeder by craning their necks through the wire, and we've just been watching one young bird who had got in to the mealworm feeder cage and eaten so many it couldn't get out again, just like Winnie the Pooh. I've been saving the combings from Poppy's long coat for several months and recently hung it all up in a fat ball feeder. Very funny to see sparrows and bluetits flying away with enormous moustaches, hardly able to take off under the mass of luxury golden fluff!
 
You need to take down the fatballs Marigold. The parents can feed the seeds to the chicks and the result is digestive impaction or at very least poor development. They should only be giving them high protein insects.

Checked our hornet traps yesterday for caught queens. 10 European hornets, 9 Asian hornets and 6 wasps- these are little pointed things that sting repeatedly for absolutely no reason.
 
The main reason for still providing bird food at this time of year is to reduce the pressure on the adults, so that they can devote their energy to finding appropriate food for their babies. I don't think our fatballs contain seeds big enough to be a problem, and they do actually have insects, ie mealworms, as part of them. Our garden is full of insect-attracting plants, but there seems to be a severe shortage of insects, especially butterflies and bees, so supporting the adult birds seems to make sense.
 
We were promised a glorious weekend, with high temperatures and sunshine. It's been cloudy, misty, and chilly so far! Not too cold if you are moving quickly, but you wouldn't stand around in it! I think everyone here is just so longing for a bit of warmth! It was actually September it turned cold here. I remember, because I was away for a 2 day/1 night stay, and it was so very cold, I had to go and buy a long sleeve teeshirt to wear under the jumper I had on! It rained all the time too. Was more like late November than September!
 
Seems a lot of Ireland had a fabulous weekend, weather wise. Our corner had coastal fog most of the time!! We got a couple of hours of clearer weather in mid/late afternoon each day, but temps, far from being the "sizzling" up to 21C forecast, struggled to get to 12/13C! However, when the sun did shine, it was nice. And we had some sunshine for a bit yesterday, following some rain on Monday night. This morning, it's dark as dusk, windy and going to pour with rain any minute.

I'm so pleased though with the stuff in the tunnel! I've never really grown much in there before, as my late husband used it for his olive trees. When he became too ill, he forgot all about it, and when he died, my son in law had to just start at the door with a chainsaw! You literally couldn't get in there. It was not so much an olive grove, as an olive jungle! Then, for a couple of years, dau & sil just filled it with tomatoes! But they never had a great harvest, because they over crowded them, and then the plants got diseased. This year, I planted potatoes in a half barrell at the end of January, beetroot and lettuce. It got a very slow start because of the extremely cold weather and snow, but now it's all doing really well. We've been eating lettuce for a couple of weeks, the beetroot are almost ready and the potatoes will be flowering within days. I'll definitely be doing that again. Half the tunnel is filled with strawberries, which are coming along nicely. If we had some sunshine, they would ripen in a couple of days.
 
IT'S HERE!!!
Finally, we've had some nice warm weather! Well, Friday, we had such heavy rain, I was afraid I was going to get stranded at dau's. Torrential rain and hailstones like peas. I feared for the apple blossom, as the trees have finally bloomed, but they hail seems to have been confined to a small area. Here, it seems, we just had the rain.
And yesterday and today (so far) have been beautifully sunny! Yesterday it got up to about 17C, which is plenty warm enough for me, when I'm strimming and mowing, I can tell you! I had to get help with one large area of the garden which hadn't been mowed because of the weather in about six weeks, and the grass was up to my knees and very wet. But it's all done, and I'm so pleased! The chickens are also delighted because the nettles had taken off in their pen and were waist high, so I took those all down yesterday.

It's just such a relief that I can do the work this year. Last year, with a badly "frozen" shoulder I couldn't use the lawnmower or strimmer, and it was so frustrating, having to get help all the time. This year, although the shoulder hasn't a lot of strength, and movement is still limited, it's at least usable, and it isn't painful. And I'm sure using it, the strength will gradually come back.

Now let's hope some of the stuff I've sown in the garden will come up!!
 
We have nightingales :-) two at least, they have been giving it some welly over the last few days. Glad your shoulder is better than it was, you are right using it will help.
 
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