Following the Aire into Leeds, we walk through a snow shower but as it clears and the sun returns we see our first warbler (chiff chaff or willow), just flown in from Africa, checking out the branches and twigs of a riverside willow.
A cormorant laboriously takes off flying upstream, into the icy wind before veering around and heading off down the valley.
The goosanders are diving so close and in such a good light that we can see the bottle-green iridescence on the drake’s head.
One more colourful item bobbing along on the Aire; Barbara’s wooly hat which blows off as we come to a wind-gap between the riverside blocks of flats. It’s close to the bottom of the eight foot stone embankment but as the nearest available branch is just three feet long we have to leave it, blown downstream by the icy wind.
