SHOCKING ENCOUNTER AND A MISSED BORDER TERRIER

Not usually being a fan of anthropomorphism, it pains me to do so here. But....when our little vole friend appeared here, the robin really did looked shocked. Not fearful resulting in immediate flying off, just shocked. 

Robin lands first....

Vole appears.....

Shocking

I have been trying to persuade the other two members of the household that Snippet needs a canine companion for at least two years now and, yesterday, I found a year old Border Terrier on preloved.co.uk who, for many reasons, sounded absolutely perfect for us. Amazingly, when I brought up the subject, it was greeted with some fairly positive comments and I was told to ask our Border Terrier owning friends what they thought before MAYBE getting in touch with the owners who lived pretty locally. So, I spoke to the friends this morning, who were very enthusiastic. I got the go ahead and at about midday, I went back to the web page trying to hold down my excitement, only to find the advert had disappeared! I was ridiculously upset; and I mean RIDICULOUSLY, given the very slim knowledge I had of him. Anyway, it has now been admitted that we are actively looking for a dog, which is great. I watch Snippet standing at the fence, staring at our neighbour's pack of five dogs, or running up and down after them and not being part of the gang. Oh dear, I'm in danger of slipping into anthropomorphism again. Don't get me wrong - he's a very happy dog and he has a great life, but when I see him playing with his 'friends', it adds a whole new dimension to his life. I'll keep you posted....we are looking for a young male, probably not a puppy and preferably already neutered, terrier of some description. A mixed mutt like Snippet would be ideal. Not too small. Stick with what I know I think. If anybody knows of anything suitable in this kind of area, do let me know! It's shocking how many young dogs there are out there for sale where people have realised having one is a massive responsibility that they're not actually ready for. At least they're not abandoning them I suppose but you'd be amazed how much money people want for them. 

Friday's weather was very strange here. the sky was leaden but we somehow managed to swerve its dropping of water or ice most of the day. You could see it falling in the distance but we only had one shower. It was fairly dramatic though, with ice balls the size of Maltesers. 

I love the fresh green of the new beech leaves against the sky in these two

A few more pictures from the last few days:

One of the nesting Nuthatches on the wall; there are definitely squeaks coming from the box now

I got a terrible shock the other day when this huge troop of soldiers appeared on the horizon

I love this beautiful dark purple periwinkle. I'd never seen it before we moved here. It tumbles down the wall from our neighbour's garden

Snippet with Fernworthy Reservoir behind

Favourite pastime 

You may have noticed my hastily cobbled together thing in the sidebar about pet portraits. I drew the lovely John Grey's dogs recently ( http://disasterfilm.blogspot.co.uk/ ) and he has framed them and put them on his blog with a link to here so I thought I'd better get myself organised in case anyone flew over to place an order. Nothing yet! Never mind; maybe one day. Now that John has published them, my next post will be one of those progress-through-a-drawing ones. 

Thanks so much to all of you who left birthday greetings in the comments. It was very, very much appreciated. Until next time, here's the lonely one, soon to be less so I hope. 

WOODPECKERS ARE BACK

Yesterday, the male Greater Spotted Woodpecker paid a visit to the feeding station and, for once, I managed to stay still enough to avoid scaring it off. Even the zoom inching out is enough to have it shoot up and away out of range. It was peeking from behind the tree checking out safety levels for five minutes before diving in:

Spending most of its life clinging to vertical surfaces seem to have made it incapable of standing up on a horizontal one. It's lower abdomen is consistently clamped to the wood and, to get onto the vertical again, it just shuffled around. He's so beautiful and I'm so glad they're both back now.

On my way to feed Trigger one morning, I was behind a small bird of prey skimming and following the road and then landing for a little while. I managed to get a picture through the windscreen but I'm afraid it suffered a bit thanks to our rubbish wind screen wiper's efforts and the fact that it was some way off. A male Sparrowhawk I think. What an amazing eye colour catching the morning sun. Incidentally, we definitely have a cuckoo here again this year. I've heard it but haven't seen it yet.

Origami Boy has conjunctivitis as well as the chest infection we've all suffered. I took him to the doctor's AGAIN this morning where he was seen first by a very nice student and then by the head of the practice alongside the student. I had told him that the coughing had now been going on for four to five weeks; the student had written down forty five weeks. I am still shaking my head more in sorrow than in anger. Stupid on SO many levels. Is this what we have in store with the next generation of doctors? He was really excellent in his manner but....well - you know. A day off school in quarantine spent picnicking by the stream and doing innocent and simple stuff with sticks and stones and water; the stuff we used to do when he was tiny. A truly magical time was had which I so appreciate in the face of his growing up. Before I know it, he'll have lost that innocence that he shares with very few children of his age. I'm very lucky. He is very much a child still and lovely for it.

Here are some more pictures from the last four days:

Foal A

One of the Dartmoor Madams having a roll

One of the many ponies I see that, from a distance, look a bit like Betty. I do miss her. I wonder where she is?

A Buzzard feather lying in the grass

Foal B

Kestor in the distance from Middle Tor

The moon yesterday morning

A new foal F with foal D - the one with the white bone marking on his shoulder

Foal D again

A rogue white Periwinkle flower amongst the blue

Sunny Chaffinch

Squatters in Trigger's field

The weather is just wonderful; not too hot but glorious sunshine. I sit on the wall while Trigger eats his food, basking in it, watching Snippet hunting rodents. Talking of food, I bought some incredibly expensive Trigger food for ponies that need to put on weight. It arrived today and I presented it to him tonight, only to have it rejected soundly with curled lips and violent bucket nudging. They don't know what's good for them. Until next time, here's Snip enjoying the sun. I hope you have it too!

REAL SIGNS OF SPRING

Today, Snippet and I went for our first walk of the year that truly felt like spring. For so many months, there has been barely a bird out there, but today, the grass was alive with little spiders, the air full of little flying insects, the odd bee and many, many birds. The sun was shining and, despite slipping over early on and bruising my knee, it was an absolute joy. Even the garden is beginning to show signs of life with many of the hedge trees starting to sprout; not the beech obviously - that will be late May if we're lucky! What follows is a record of everything I managed to photograph. there was a lot that I didn't get: a Wheatear, a couple of Palmate Newts and a trio of Buzzards soaring together.

We started in the garden where Celandine is at last flowering:

Past the big Beech tree on a wall where periwinkle tumbles:

As we walked up the path along the stream onto the moor, I spotted this pheasant; an unusual sight up here and it looked very unsure of itself:

I went to check the place where we put all the rescued frog spawn and saw this toad spawn in the water. Two Newts shot off as I got there so these may not last long. 

On the way over to the stream near the tin shepherd's hut, we saw these lambs. I don't usually see them out on the moor; the farmers normally keep them in fields until they're older.

Then, in the distance, I spotted a mare and foal. Foal D. 

Another dark coloured one. Not black, but after last year's endless skewbalds, it's lovely to see more traditional Dartmoor colours. They were very shy, so the zoom was in action, hence slight fuzziness:

A Meadow Pippet. There were lots and lots of them out today.

A small Tortoiseshell by the stream. Terrible picture - sorry. Zoom rather than macro.I was just amazed to see one at all.

Plant life in the stream. Didn't have time to trawl through books to check what it is.....apologies.

As we walked up the hill away form the stream, I spotted ANOTHER mare and foal. Foal E. Another dark one and enchanting again:

A long walk home again with a few misses again. Only managed to capture another Meadow Pippet:

A cup of Lapsang Souchong and a slice of walnut cake once home. Out again at 3.00pm to feed Trigger. We have a resident Pied Wagtail who joins us at feeding time:

Home again to wait for the school bus. A lovely day including starting a drawing which I'll post about another day. Until next time, here's Snippet today.