Don't mention the football!

I arose at a very early hour and found myself at The Scrubs at 6am in the company of accomplished bird artist, Jan Wilczur. He called me last night to ask if I could escort him around my 'garden' so that he could look at the habitat management with a view to going back to his local patch - Richmond Park in south London - with some ideas for the people who manage his patch. 

Overall, he was impressed with The Scrubs and found himself being pleasantly surprised by the area's beauty and by the uniqueness of our grassland. He gushed about The Scrub's c5 pairs of Meadow Pipit and the general abundance of undergrowth around the site. Unfortunately, the deer in his park put paid to the possibilities of any extensive areas of undergrowth.

Bird-wise, we saw a distant probable Peregrine, around ten Meadow Pipit, our Skylark pair, 3 Chiffchaff, c6 Jackdaw (scarce here), 2 Stock Dove and at least 50 Herring Gulls, most of whom were coasting the thermals overhead.

It was a beautiful, if cold, day today and seeing as it was Mothering Sunday I dropped into my mums bearing flowers and a small present. We chewed the fat for the rest of the afternoon which was only spoilt by the constant background bickering that emanated from the Eastenders episode on the box.