I am hoping that the chick made it out of the egg and was in the nest being fed by her parents. This is a blackbird egg. A baby blackbird, to my untutored eye, looks much like a female sparrow. In fact, the SBJs (small brown jobs) I've seen in my garden and have assumed were sparrows were probably baby blackbirds.
Anyway, my wren is back building the nest. They build tunnels with a cave at the end apparently. I was interested to see this but got distracted by this video... which I ended up watching all the way through. Check out how clever the birds are getting long sticks in the hole, how frustrated one is by the leaf. Then, feeding and cleaning those hatchlings... Jesus. It's amazing.
So, I have notes back from Ben-the-Supervisor. Useful, as ever. The dog is still stiff despite all the time on the Theraplate. I am no more cheerful.
However, the gods (Freya?) were looking after me last night. I couldn't sleep and came down for a drink... and because it's much cooler downstairs. I must have opened the back door to see if outside was cooler than inside. It wasn't. Then I went back to bed. the cats didn't come and I still couldn't sleep. After about half an hour I came back downstairs to see where they were. That's when I realised I'd left the back door open. Panic. I turned around and saw Wuji walking toward me inside the house. I held him and then went outside, closing the door. At least I had one cat. I called, quietly and started to walk up the path. I heard the quietest possible mew. I thought it was Wuji inside. It was a scared or trapped mew. I went a few steps further and heard the mews, coming closer and there, the darkness shaped itself into Buji. I picked him up, went inside and gave both of them strokes and scratches and told them how happy I was.
But it reignites my guilt about the lack of liberty... although there'd be no safe space for fledgling birds with cats on the prowl.
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