Wild West Yorkshire nature diary, Friday 4th June 1999
AFTER AN EVENING SHOWER, a rainbow arcs over the valley. The farmer is rolling up the silage on a hillside field. We're fascinated by the machine that picks up the Swiss rolls and wraps them up in a broad ribbon of black plastic. An action like an acrobat juggling a barrel with his feet.
As we stand watching, a Hare runs across the field, along the contour of the hillside, crouches for a moment by the first row of mown grass, then hurdles across the remaining rows. At the other side of the hedge in the next field its sits with ears vertical then runs off into longer grasses, keeping its ears down, below the grass tops, for much of the way.
There seems to have been a national decline in hare numbers, so we're very pleased to see this one. On average, if we're lucky, we see only one each year. On an adjacent field we hear a Skylark singing and watch it parachute down amongst the long grass, which unfortunately will soon be cut for silage. This is another species in decline nationally. Its presence, and that of Yellowhammers and Snipe, demonstrates the quality of our local stretch of valley. The Reed Bunting nests here too, but I don't recall having heard one sing this year.
Two Blackbird chicks follow the adult around the garden. I let three House Sparrows out of the cold frame, they've got in through a broken pane. Fledgling birds are much in evidence.
AFTER AN EVENING SHOWER, a rainbow arcs over the valley. The farmer is rolling up the silage on a hillside field. We're fascinated by the machine that picks up the Swiss rolls and wraps them up in a broad ribbon of black plastic. An action like an acrobat juggling a barrel with his feet.
As we stand watching, a Hare runs across the field, along the contour of the hillside, crouches for a moment by the first row of mown grass, then hurdles across the remaining rows. At the other side of the hedge in the next field its sits with ears vertical then runs off into longer grasses, keeping its ears down, below the grass tops, for much of the way.
There seems to have been a national decline in hare numbers, so we're very pleased to see this one. On average, if we're lucky, we see only one each year. On an adjacent field we hear a Skylark singing and watch it parachute down amongst the long grass, which unfortunately will soon be cut for silage. This is another species in decline nationally. Its presence, and that of Yellowhammers and Snipe, demonstrates the quality of our local stretch of valley. The Reed Bunting nests here too, but I don't recall having heard one sing this year.
Two Blackbird chicks follow the adult around the garden. I let three House Sparrows out of the cold frame, they've got in through a broken pane. Fledgling birds are much in evidence.