Nature Notes

A late bit of Christmas village news was of an arrival down the chimney not of a rotund gentleman with a sack of presents but a bird. It turned out to be a kestrel that looked as shocked as the householders, perhaps it had been looking for a place to roost, but found its way by accident down the chimney. Fortunately no fire was lit.

The cold winter weather reached a low point of -9oC in our sheltered back garden. Not unsurprisingly such freezing weather had an impact on the wildlife of the village. In ours and surrounding gardens up to five blackbirds at a time could be seen. They were searching for any area of snow free ground so food could be discovered. The blackbirds were also joined a couple of redwings. These small thrushes, have a distinct eye stripe and a red patch on their flanks. They could have travelled from as far a field as their breeding grounds in Finland to reach the normally relatively mild east Kent. Another cold weather visitor which I have never seen before in ten years of watching our garden was a brambling. It was in amongst a flock of 16 chaffinches that appeared briefly in the trees.

Whilst making the most of all the opportunities to go sledging with Nicole, I was struck (quite literally) by the different forms of snow that fall from the sky. It seemed to vary from large wet conglomerations of flakes, to fine light dust and even round pellets of snow the size of the head of a match but not compacted like hail. How and why these form is an area that needs more research …..Google here we go.

Enjoy the winter.

Paul Holt
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