As far as rare/scarce birds go, I'm pretty sure everyone remembers the first one. But a few days ago someone asked a much trickier question .... What was the first bird you ever saw .... the first species you were ever aware of ? Now that's a deep sort of question ..almost unanswerable for most people, unless they lived in the Antarctic Research Station of similar. My earliest memories of birds were .... Well ... I lived 3 stories up for the first 11 years of my life. It was a huge building which had a Darby and Joan Club on the ground floor, and the Air Training Corps Headquarters on the middle floor, and a weight-lifting club in the basement. And, a Scout/Cub hut in the field. And Gordon, Doris and me up top ... plus a rotating transient retinue of lodgers who became "aunts" and "uncles" in the course of time. At least it increased my birthday and Christmas presents considerably. [ Hey ... I've found a picture of it .... it's up at the top. Not only is it a business now, the huge fields out the back have become a ginormous supermarket. I wheedled my way into what was once "my" house many years ago, and went up to the top floor, and instead of seeing a fine vista of ,yes, fields... all I could see was a giant brick wall 5 feet away. Rubbish !! ] Anyhow, one of my first (winter) memories is chucking slices of bread out of the window and watching them spiral down onto the field at the back of the house...whereupon loads of Starlings would descend on them like vultures. But I suspect that the birds that I really experienced first were Rooks. Right opposite our high-up third-floor windows was a huge rookery .... in the grounds of a giant vicarage. The vicar wasn't a giant, just the house. Well, he might have been ... I don't think I ever saw him. But those Rooks made a massive racket all the time ..... so even if we weren't looking at them, they made themselves known. And Rooks are always interesting. And characterful. [ But ... over the last 8 years or so, they have declined dramatically where I live.] So that's my first bird memory ...but what about you ?
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AuthorThat's the author up there ... I was young and sprightly then. Archives
October 2022
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