12.15 p.m., 60°F, 15°C: As I draw the blackthorn from the end of our garden, rival blackbirds are singing about a hundred yards apart at the edge of the wood. It’s a great stereophonic accompaniment for me as I work and it occurs to me that the less mellow, hurried song of the dunnock sounds like a tape being rapidly rewound.
I’m also hearing great tit, wood pigeon and a crow cawing.
At the edge of the meadow, a small tortoiseshell flies past, low over the grasses, bramble and the ferny rosettes of emerging cow parsley.
Later I see a magpie fly down to our garden hedge, alarming the resident male blackbird. The magpie disappears into the hedge but emerges, I’m relieved to see, without any evidence that it has located and robbed the blackbird’s nest. Keeping an eye on the fracas, a carrion crow flies down to next door’s apple tree, a song post for the blackbird.
