Nuthatch

A nuthatch paid a short visit to the witch hazel just up the garden path from where the shed used to be this morning, which as far as the blog record (both here and the other place (http://www.pumpkinstrokemarrow.blogspot.co.uk/) goes is the first sighting since the morning of Walpurgisnacht 2011. The next before that being on the Common on June 18th 2008, rather than at home. This last post alleges that the demise of the home nuthatch is all to do with the demise of the bird feeder, but I now wonder whether it was not also to do with the demise of the adjacent bush magnolia (possibly a magnolia liliiflora nigra), removed because it was obstructing the path to the washing line. Maybe visiting nuthatches like to have a bush to visit, maybe containing the bugs that their long straight beak suggests to be their preferred diet. Maybe also to hide in while they keep an eye out for the main chance.

The posting also talks of playing the aeroplane game at Clapham Junction. I had completely forgotten that I had played the game all those years ago, thinking that it was an invention of and for retirement. A game for the idle poor, or at least those too poor to indulge in golf or cruising. Not the sort of thing that proper commuters did at all.

Which reminds me that I scored a three at Earlsfield yesterday, and had the passing trains been kind, that is to say had not kept getting in the way at the crucial moment, I might have made a four. My rule is that you have to take in all four (if four is the number you are going for) in a single sweep across the sky from right to left (it clearly not being possible to hold all four in view at the same time without the use of mirrors) and one needs to keep sweeping to make sure one knows where all the aeroplanes are, otherwise they are apt to get lost in all the clutter and one has to waste valuable seconds finding them again. I am getting better.