Shire Sightings.

I saw the first baby robin of the season today. It’s always a delight, not just because of their speckled buff and brown chests, but because they have such a self-assured air abut them. I normally see baby birds following their parents around, flapping their wings by way of asking to be fed and having a general air of uncertainty about them. Not so the robin. Robins are loners by nature and the babies start as they mean to go on. They’re independent, sigma types, and can even be feisty with adult birds when some perception of need arises. I’ve posted this pic before, but I’ll forgive myself posting it again.

 

 

 

And then this morning I encountered the postie, and he told me that he’d seen a Red Deer stag on the common above the village. As far as I know, I was the first person to see Red Deer stags in these parts – two of them in fact – about three years ago. And then Mrs Murphy who owns the pub was severely startled by one leaping over a hedge in front of her one day. Red Deer make light work of leaping over hedges, it seems. They’re big and can be a bit scary at close quarters. So this is a Red Deer stag. (Both pics are stock shots, by the way, not mine.)

 

 

 

And that’s it for today because it’s been otherwise uneventful (apart from briefly giving my undivided attention to the slightly mad little scrufty dog at the bottom of the lane which barks aggressively while wagging its tail frantically and begging to be fussed. It always gets fussed by me.)