It's bathtime

[kiloran]

Ridiculously hot and dry weather in west-central scotland for the past few weeks and the sparrows are loving it. There's currently half a dozen having a dust bath in the dry soil, another 5 having a real splash in one of the 12 inch saucers we put on the ground for the birds and foxes, another 3 having a splash in another saucer and 2 starlings in the main birdbath. Maybe I should go out and join them.

I just love the way the sparrows do things together, they're like a bunch of schoolkids out to play.

--kiloran

[Itsallaguess]

Ridiculously hot and dry weather in west-central scotland for the past few weeks and the sparrows are loving it. There's currently half a dozen having a dust bath in the dry soil, another 5 having a real splash in one of the 12 inch saucers we put on the ground for the birds and foxes, another 3 having a splash in another saucer and 2 starlings in the main birdbath. Maybe I should go out and join them.

I just love the way the sparrows do things together, they're like a bunch of schoolkids out to play.

One of the best things we ever did was move our bird-bath to a position much nearer to our kitchen window, where it also now catches the sun wonderfully when the sparrows and starlings start one of their bath-fests, spraying water all over the place.

It's great to see in this sunny weather, and one of the best, free delights we can hope for when we're washing up and watching out into the garden.

I'm constantly amazed at how much pleasure I seem to get from little things like this nowadays. I'm not really sure why that is, but it's something I've really noticed over recent months.

Cheers,

Itsallaguess

[bungeejumper]

I'm constantly amazed at how much pleasure I seem to get from little things like this nowadays. I'm not really sure why that is, but it's something I've really noticed over recent months.

For me, at least, it's partly that the world has got so much messier in the last couple of years. My work brings me into daily contact with the news from Trump and Brexit and the volatile financial markets and the collapsing standards of public probity, and all that stuff. And it's rather nice to look out of the window and realise that not everything out there is chaotic and unpredictable.

The swallows are back (at last), and the blossom this year has been magnificent, and the world carries on just the way it always did for the sparrows and the blackbirds and all the rest of the wildlife who'll be there long after all of us are gone. (Shall we make a dishonourable exception for those pesky rodents, kiloran?). And the sun down in the south has been putting in an appearance now and then.

I've also finally started taking my SIPP pension in the last six months, and I've had a serious run-in with a nasty health problem (which was finally signed off yesterday - yippee!) - and one way and another, it's all coming into perspective. Nature's the greatest healer of them all.

Apologies for sounding a bit zen.

BJ

[AleisterCrowley]

Yep, I really enjoy my walks down by the river(s)* at this time of year
Nothing 'rare' - ducks and swans, Egyptian geese (a solitary pair), occasional red kites over the wooded area, big crows hopping across the Eton cricket pitches
And not forgetting the very friendly cat who is occasionally waiting near the footbridge... https://goo.gl/maps/7ELaqW7ajcz


*Thames, and Jubilee River flood relief