TWO MALE BLACKBIRDS puff themselves up and pose stiffly on a garden wall. Like our neigbours in the semi-detached opposite, they take this low wall as a territorial marker. After a short, tense, stand off, they launch themselves vertically, pecking at each other, and, with the skill of mime artists, trace an invisible vertical extension to the wall.The fight spills briefly onto the pavement. The resident at Chris and Julie's gets the better of Ronnie and Brenda's bird.
In a city centre tree, one Crow sits huddled, its wing trailing as if damaged. Another lands on a grassy terrace by a block of flats. From this angle, as it swaggers along, it seems to have remarkably long legs.
The first Daisies I've noticed are here on the grass verge between the flowering cherry trees.Richard Bell,
wildlife illustrator
E-mail;'richard@daelnet.co.uk'
