Spring?
Today’s forecast was initially not too bad considering the track record but it worsened considerably overnight. We had been looking forward to something dry. We are now offered more or less constant rain with a high of … wait for it … 6°C, and that’s the real temperature, not the “feels like” which struggles to a high of 5°C.
Why am I here? Because I have a wet new air awning, that’s why I’m here.
For the first time in what must be two years, we began the day in an early bright spell by mounting our bukes and cycling to my favourite butchers shop up the road in Ludham. There’s a pleasantly quiet back lanes route to take. There was still a biting wind. It’s a mercifully short ride and it didn’t hurt as much as I expected.
Francine had seen a sign outside the butcher proclaiming “well hung steaks”. Well, red rag to a bull. I donned my required facemask and wandered in.
“My wife sent me to get her something well hung”, I began. “At least, I think she said ‘something’; I suppose she may have said ‘someone’”.
Their well hung sirloin steaks looked just the job. Armed with steaks, old English pork sausages and smoked back bacon rashers, we reversed our back lanes route and cycled back into the headwind.
After the traditional bright start, our forecast was for an overcast but essentially dry day reaching the dizzy heights of 11°C. We set off to investigate a boardwalk at Barton Broad, which a helpful man had mentioned when we met at Alderfen. We were both pleasantly surprised when the bright spells continued through the morning and much of the afternoon.
A well organized car park with toilet facilities was situated a short walk along a lane to the boardwalk. The one piece of interesting wildlife that I spotted, an Orange Tip butterfly, may have been struggling with the chilly conditions ‘cos it settled during a dull spell, promptly closing its wings. Orange Tips don’t settle often and they aren’t given to posing, either, even when they do. We watched intently while the dark cloud made its way across the sun, causing another walking couple to wonder why we were staring intently at the hedge. Always fun. I pointed out my subject, wondering if a bright interlude might encourage it to open its wings and bask a little. Sure enough it did; this happens rarely. It’s nice to document a settle Orange Tip with its wings open but I think I prefer the side shot from an aesthetics point of view.
The boardwalk itself produced nothing, zip, nada, ”pas un chat” as they say in France.
Sunny spells continued through much of the afternoon and more shopping, for something less well hung, this time. They ceased, of course, and the sky blackened alarmingly just as I was thinking of barbecuing. I wrapped up and went for it anyway. I appeared to have no support from other like-minded lunatics.
The well hung sirloin was excellent, as were the old English pork sausages.
As advertised, overnight we were pummelled by gusting 45mph winds and lashed by the horizontal rain that they carried. Our new air awning is still up and seems to have survived. I have had to engineer a solution to stop the padded sides vibrating against the van.
Regrettably the wind is also still up and the rain is still coming down – well, across, anyway. I must say that the materiel of the new awning seems excellent; very water repellent. We have had awnings beneath which you can feel a fine mist in bad weather. Nothing of that sort here.
These weather conditions persisted pretty much all day, save for a short lull in the lashing rain mid-afternoon when we braved the elements and went out to get blown to St. Bennett’s Abbey before fighting our way back along the dyke beside the River Ant into a stiff headwind. Our walk certainly blew away the cobwebs but could hardly have been described as pleasant. Francine snagged the abbey on her telephone. Well, why not? Now, if I could just make a phone call on my camera we might have something.
The rain resumed its horizontal trajectory five minutes after we were safely back inside Guillaume.
… and you may read that how you like. 😀
We’ve been caravanning for 35 years, or thereabouts. The Caravan Club even sent us a fancy sticker proclaiming “30 Years Membership” to slap in Guillaume’s window. This, of course, makes you feel like a complete prat when you cock something up.
Although my initial reason for wanting a modest caravan was to avoid tent pegs – I’d had trouble smacking pegs into the ground on more than one occasion during our earlier tenting times in France – I eventually bowed to pressure [no prizes guessing from where] and, In our 35 years, we’ve now amassed quite a catalogue of sun canopies and porch awnings.
A sun canopy was our first choice to provide Mr. Sunburns-Readily with some shade against the otherwise delightful Mediterranean sun that he loves so much. A sun canopy is (or was then) like a full width awning but without the enclosing front panels; really just a roof and side panels pretty much the same size as the caravan. You get quite steamy sitting under/in them beneath a blazing sun but at least you don’t burn.
I learnt a lesson with a sun canopy in the west of France one year. We’d arrived at our chosen campsite near the oyster beds around La Tremblade with a good, stiff breeze blowing. Foolishly, I now know, once we’d chosen our pitch and set up, I started to erect my head-saving sun canopy. With no protective front wall, the wind got inside and grabbed said canopy giving it a darn good shaking, whereupon the centre roof pole came loose, fell, swung down and dented the side of our caravan. “Bother”, said Pooh, remarkably crossly. This was entirely my fault.
Eventually, largely for some shorter trips in the vagaries of UK weather, I weakened yet again and we tried a few porch awnings, which are really an enclosed cover for the caravan door in which to store a table, chairs, walking boots etc, in the dry. [Give me the Mediterranean sun every time.] I think I can count four such contrivances of varying designs.
One of these designs had carbon-fibre poles one of which was a sort of U-shaped horizontal hoop with both ends braced against the caravan to hold the awning out. Other poles, of course, held the awning up. I was amazed how a half-sized porch awning could require more of the effin’ pegs that I’d been so keen to avoid in the first place, than did a full sized sun canopy. Nonetheless this one did. I was even more surprised when, during one particular windy day, the perfectly safely erected porch awning rattled against the side of the caravan causing the U-shaped pole ends to dent the caravan side panel. “Bother”, repeated Pooh, extremely crossly once again. For this mishap, I disclaim responsibility.
Time and technology have moved on. Prior to this Norfolk trip we ordered yet another porch awning, one of the new-fangled “air” porch awnings. This is at least our fourth and may be our fifth. Gone are the poles that can damage the side panels of caravans. In their place is/are one or more inflatable rubber tubes with a diameter of about 80mm [I’m guessing]. Now, instead of carrying a bag full of poles, you have to carry a ruddy great pump to blow the 80mm tube(s) up to 7psi. We Click-and-Collected our new “air” awning on Saturday afternoon after we’d arrived and got settled.
I must say that the erection process went smoothly. [Insert smutty comment here.] I think, however, that my tubing may be over-inflated. I take full responsibility for getting too stiff. There’s a handy pressure gauge on the pump but, with the non-return valve to prevent deflation, having pumped, said pressure gauge drops rapidly back to zero before you can see what pressure it’s attained. No matter, at least it’s a good, firm erection. [Insert smutty ….]
I find this air technology a bit flaky. Granted, there are no poles damaging yet another essentially new caravan. I’m a little leery of the rigidity of a 7psi tube, though, even if over-inflated. I wouldn’t want to lose it in the middle of the night, if you see what I mean. As luck would have it, we are pitched looking at an example of a limp air awning and here it is; it sags in a most unattractive manner. It’s a sad sight and I feel very sorry for this chap who keeps coming out to try and blow it up again.
Tonight and tomorrow will be a good test of our flaky technology. This evening we have a >95% chance of rain with winds gusting to 45mph. In that poor chap’s place, I think I’d adopt the approach that if you can’t keep it up then it’s better to save face and take it down. [Insert smutty …] If a 45mph wind gets hold of that collapsing awning it could be quite entertaining.
The brightest part of today was forecast to be early morning, so we had just one cup of coffee to wake up, partially at least, before wandering down the road to Ludham Bridge for a saunter along the River Ant. I know there’s a colony of Variable damselflies nearby but I thought it’d be too early for those in these temperatures, both seasonally too early and too early in the day. Nonetheless, ever hopeful of other insect interest, I mounted my 40-150 lens with a 1.4X.
Naturally there was no sign of anything insect-like, certainly not flying around and I saw only one fly sitting. I can’t get excited about most diptera; hoverflies are an exception but I didn’t find any of those, either. Given air temperature blowing across the reed beds, I was less than surprised.
Nonetheless, it’s a pleasant walk and we continued along the track to the frequent rattling of Reed Warblers in the … yes, reeds. They keep up an almost constant chatter but you rarely actually see them.
Part way along our route we flushed a large bird from the reeds beside the river. We though Heron at first but no, as it turned to drift across our track I could see it was a raptor, a Marsh Harrier (Circus aeruginosus). How’s that for a genus name: Circus? Wonderful. So was the bird. Where’s my 300mm lens when I needed it, though? I got a few less than wonderful pictures with my slightly-too-small lens as teh majestic bird casually drifted off into the distance.
It must have done some sort of loop while we weren’t watching. We’d popped down a short side track for a nose and as we turned I saw it flying back from the direction we’d come. This time the bird was closer and crossing us and the poor little lens (it’s actually a very good piece of glass) did a reasonable job, though bigger would’ve been better. You can rarely be over-lensed when it comes to birds and what a glorious bird this is.
Working off a traditional first morning fried breakfast – call it brunch by the time we had it – we spent 90 minutes or so over lunch time at Alderfen. Alderfen is a Norfolk Wildlife Trust reserve and one of my personal favourites. It was very quiet; very quiet and very boggy so it’s a good job we’d got our wellies in the car. More than half way around our loop we’d seen nothing, nada, rien. At the final turn back towards the car a Large Red Damselfly (Pyrrhosoma nymphula) flew around me, low down, and disappeared. Bother. A little further on I did find a second suspect sitting more cooperatively so I got some proof for a record. Nearly at the car, a third fluttered up into the trees.
We continued past the car onto a track on the opposite side of the reserve. We’d never been down this one before but a small stream trickles along beside it so it looked promising. It was; we got our count up to nine. Our mates were braving a still chill wind coming down from the north. Most of these were tenerals taking their maiden flights but the one I snagged looked more mature. Still, season underway in this part of Norfolk.
Pinch and a punch, the first of the month. White rabbits, and other nonsensical phrases.
We didn’t get to use Guillaume last year. I did have to tow him up to the midlands for his first annual service but that was the extent of his travels and my practice. It went well and then he sat in his field under cover until this week.
With Covid-19 restrictions relaxed enough for campsites to reopen, we’d managed to get 10 days booked in one of my favourite sites on the Norfolk Broads. With some trepidation, I uncovered Guillaume and dragged him out of his field and round to our place for spring clean. This went without a hitch. Well, there was one hitch – I had to hitch Guillaume up to the car, of course. 😀
Having been covered up for the better part of 18 months, Guillaume was in pretty good shape. I amused a few neighbours by driving him into his parking bay solo on the electric mover. The young lad next door missed the performance but was told. He didn’t understand the concept of a mover. I was expecting an audience when the time came to hitch up and move off.
We’ve had this van for two years; used it for one and mothballed it for another. We weren’t experts anyway but trying to remember how it functioned was now something of a struggle. I finally figured out the switches which, incidentally, are unilluminated push buttons, so modern that you can’t tell if they’re on of off. A good old fashioned rocker switch with an on position and an off position is much more obvious. As to driving the heating system, which, given this incessant freezing northerly wind we were bound to need, is another issue. We’ll figure it out.
D-Day: Departure Day. We can’t get into the campsite before 13:00 so I wanted to set sail at 10:00. We were ready way before 10:00 and dangled around thumb-twiddling, waiting to wait, until time moved on.
At 09:45 I went out and began readying Guillaume for travel. My audience appeared so, somewhat unnecessarily, I used the mover to hitch him up to the car. Test lights, adjust towing mirrors, and set sail at 10:00.
At 10:10, for some unaccountable reason, I realized that I’d left my wallet in the house. “Bother”, said Pooh, very crossly. What a complete and utter plonker – all that time in hand and I didn’t even think of my wallet. With a caravan in tow, this is a major cock-up; ya don’t just pop back easily. I spun around a roundabout and returned – not to our road, ‘cos it’s a dead end and I couldn’t drop a U-turn with the van on the back. No, I got somewhere close, parked and kicked Francine out of the car to retrieve the naughty wallet.
At 10:30, complete with retrieved wallet, we hit the road to try again.
I told you this was straining the poor old memory.
Some decent weekend weather presented us with our first attempt at entertaining, in the garden of course, since lockdown was eased. Four of us gathered to share a barbecued shoulder of lamb.
On most occasions when I used to travel in the States on business, I did so alone. I was in Richmond, Virginia many times and on one visit I had turned up to a restaurant but had to wait for a table to become available. I sat at the bar waiting. Eventually I heard myself being paged over the intercom:
Franco, party of one …
One hardly constitutes a party, I thought; that was after I had also thought “Oh, how embarrassing”. Still, four can definitely constitute a party in these strained times.This, of course, meant we had lamb shoulder bones for our visiting wildlife. I put them out at 23:00.
The new set of batteries in Foxcam worked; the video clips are back to a consistent length.
Good ol’ fox-formerly-known-as-Limpy pitched up at 01:25 and was in the garden working on the bones for 40 minutes. I’d actually trimmed some excess fat off and had put those pieces out, too. Limpy munched those first and eventually, once again, juggled both the knuckle bone and the blade bone into his mouth at once. He wandered around carrying his prize but returned to paw the ground where, I suspect, a few scraps remained.
Headlights the Badger put in an appearance at 02:30. He trotted around the garden but by now all the offerings had gone. When I tried putting peanuts out for any passing badgers I discovered that foxes like peanuts, too. Foxes tend to be earlier so the badger tends to get nothing.
The fox with the curiously misshaped brush wandered through at 04:20. We got a better profile of the shape of the tail this time. I’m still not convinced that this is Ratty with the brush growing back. This profile shows the muzzle markings and they seem different to me, as well as the fox looking slighter.
Come to that, the brush tip (what there is of it) looks a different colour, too.
Our pair of Great Tits appear to have finished nest building. Now, something different and, perhaps, more entertaining is going on.
We have patio furniture beneath the nest box – away from the house wall but basically beneath the box. I had recently spotted one of the Great Tits, I think the male, perching on the back of one of the chairs chirping occasionally. He would sometimes change position to another chair back, or the table, and chirp again. This behaviour went on for several minutes.
Yesterday the same thing happened twice, once around lunchtime and again in the early evening, which is when these pictures were taken through a not-entirely-clean kitchen window. The chirping male frequently glanced up at the nest box. Once or twice he even flew up to the box then returned to his perch. On both occasions, the episode finished when the partner flew out of the nest box.
Here’s our theory, which may be total rubbish. 🙂
We suspect that this happens when Mrs. Great Tit visits the nest to lay an egg. Mr. Great Tit agitatedly paces around outside the delivery room like an expectant father, keeps in verbal touch and every now and then pops his head around the door to check on progress. Eventually Mrs. Great Tit gets through with her task and flies off to brew up another.
We know that swans, for example, lay an egg a day for up to seven days before sitting on the completed clutch to begin incubation. Egg development doesn’t start until they are brought up to a certain temperature by being incubated. We think that’s what’s going on here.
I’ve been foxed by British-bloody-Summer-Time. There’s often some timepiece that one forgets to adjust. Why must we change the clocks? Midday, 12:00, is when the sun is at its height, for Darwin’s sake. Making midday an hour past the zenith makes no sense.
I’d been through my stills cameras, my proper cameras with decent optics, adjusting them but I forgot to reset foxcam. No matter, it was hardly calamitous. It’s just that I though fox-formerly-known-as-Limpy had turned up particularly early at 21:40. Then I realized that I hadn’t even put the chicken carcass out until 22:00. DUH! 😀
So, fox-formerly-known-as-Limpy pitched up at 22:40, attracted by the smell of a luscious, free range, Dutchy organic chicken carcass courtesy of Waitrose. I’m still trying to make up for the unidentified frying objects containing pork slurry from Aldi. Here he is and said luscious, free range, Dutchy organic chicken carcass is to his left.
A while later foxcam, still too early for BST, caught Limpy wandering around the garden with the entire luscious, free range, Dutchy organic chicken carcass firmly clamped in his jaws. He wandered towards Foxcam. Not content with his mouthful, he attempted to pick up a supplementary piece of chicken which I imagine must have been a winglet. I think he actually managed it; very dextrous. [Can one be dextrous with a mouth? Just a thought.]
At 02:40 FAT [Foxcam Adjusted Time] Headlights the Badger turned up, tripping the infrared light fantastic until it decided to dump its bum on the so-called grass for a spot of scent marking/peeing. Much relieved, it presented itself to foxcam quite nicely thereafter.
The night wasn’t over yet. Another fox, with a very differently shaped tail, turned up at 04:50 FAT. About one third of the way down, the brush looked pinched, much less full. We had seen a very distinctive fox that we called Ratty with a very scrappy tail many weeks ago. We haven’t seen it since. Our first thought was that this new fox could’ve been Ratty with the fur on the tail growing back. I’m not convinced, though – this fox looks slighter, less heavily built. A mystery.
Foxcam had been recording seemingly random length video clips for the first time, not the 20s I’d set. Sure that this was nothing to do with having forgotten BST, I contacted NatureSpy, the suppliers. They suggested this is the first sign that the batteries are running low, even though the battery condition indicator looks fine. I’ll change ‘em.
[Insert your very own schoolboy comment here – you know you’re thinking it.]
Last year our trusty old wooden nest box was used, as usual, by a pair of Blue Tits (Cyanistes caeruleus). We could hear the chicks chattering away inside in between feeding visits by the parents. Unfortunately, for the first time that we’d noticed, at least one of our resident Great Spotted Woodpeckers (Dendrocopos major) became very interested and started chipping away at the wooden box.
Well, there’s nothing like a pair of tits to get a pecker interested. [There, not wishing to disappoint readers that’s my schoolboy comment.]
GSWs are well known for attacking smaller birds’ nests. We sent off for a tailor-made metal plate designed to reinforce the entrance hole of the box and I glued thicker pieces of wood onto the sides and front for added protection – our determined woodpecker was chipping away at the sides, as well as the front. The result was not pretty but it did serve its purpose and the clutch of Blue Tit chicks fledged successfully. Happily my meddling didn’t deter the parents.
We needed a new nest box and preferably one that was armoured. We finally settled on a Vivara Pro Seville [yikes] 32mm nest box made from a composite material called WoodStone, which I got from the Natural History Book Service. NHBS broadened from its beginnings as a bookshop into a wildlife equipment supplier. Our smart new box arrived and felt more like concrete; very strong.
Until recently we’d been disappointed that, though our garden remained full of birds feeding, none seemed to be showing any interest in the smart new nest box. Maybe it was too smart and needed to weather a bit?
Apparently not; we were relieved this week when disinterest changed and a pair of Great Tits (Parus major) took possession, ferrying in nest material furiously. This was very exciting; we’d always had Blue Tits before so Great Tits would make an interesting change.
Foxcam had to be repurposed. [Puke!]
I set the camera on its tripod on top of our patio table and aimed it at the nesting box. It managed to snag a couple of shots, though the birds were too fast most of the time and eluded Titcam, which is a bit slow to trigger. Here’s one of our Great Tits entering, though it’s dropped a few bits of nesting material in squeezing through the hole.
Nest building continues apace. We saw both adults gathering material from our “lawn” (I use the term loosely), though that was soon used up and they ventured further afield.
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