It seems like a long time since my last post but then I've had to be in the UK since late Oct as poor old Mam's not very well.
Except for the flock which I saw on the way to Poitiers, I missed the crane migration but Stella tells me that is was substantial and protracted.
One thing about a prolonged absence is that you notice the differences more. There are not many leaves left on the trees but far more than I expected for mid December; the winter wheat is well up and the landscape looks remarkably green. The temperature is a few degrees up on the Isle of Wight and much warmer than that in Glos.
As for the birds, I've yet to see a black redstart and it was difficult not to fall over one only 7 weeks ago. All the summer visitors have of course long gone except for the odd chiffchaff which I have heard singing (and I daresay there are some blackcaps around somewhere). There is little sign of winter visitors though, presumably as the weather has been so mild north of here---but that seems to have changed this week. I did see a couple of fieldfares fly over La Poterie yesterday as I was viewing the progress on the re-constructed house. And I had brief views of a merlin near La Tache on the 8th.
A walk around La Tache on the 9th gave several woodpecker sightings including a lesser spotted in the old chestnut trees. Nuthatches were very noisy and the fields held several meadow pipits.
Black Redstart is the first bird on my list when we moved to the Charente. They seem to be all over the place, they have been in our roof and until I blocked their entrance (they were making such a mess everywhere) they were in the barn as well. Diane
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