A new record for the garden this morning. A song thrush (Turdus philomelos) was walking and hopping down the garden path feeding as it went.
We’ve had their relatives, blackbird (Turdus merula), redwing (Turdus iliacus) and fieldfare (Turdus pilaris) in the garden but not this one. A real pleasure to see!
In my youth I used to see these quite often and remember the tap-tapping sound as they laid into a snail. It made me wonder seeing this one this morning, why they have been in decline. The thought crossed my mind that as gardeners have been so determined to put pay especially to slugs and sometimes to a lesser extent, snails. It may have contributed to their decline.
One has been singing near by in recent days. Maybe this bird was the same one. I love those repeated phrases. Lot’s have been written about them by poets. In Birds Britannica by Cocker and Mabey, they tell how this thrush mimics and repeats phrases and how it is embedded into the British psyche.
Seeing it also put me in mind of the scene in The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien where the Thrush guides Bilbo and his companions to a secret doorway by being present when they were looking for the way in to the mountain.
‘At that very moment he heard a sharp crack behind him. There on the grey stone in the grass was an enormous thrush, nearly coal black, it’s pale yellow breast freckled with dark spots. Crack! It had caught a snail and was knocking it on the stone. Crack! Crack!
Suddenly Bilbo understood.’
The thrush in the story may not have been a song thrush, yet it was key to the story.
I love these kind of moments, epiphanies – where your mind has been mulling over something and you have a flash of inspiration. I like to think that the Spirit of the Lord is at work behind the scenes bringing things to light.
Another moment of joy occurred on Sunday past. We had finished our dinner. The grown-ups were sitting round the table chatting. A movement caught my eye just by the bird feeder. A male bullfinch (Pyrrhula pyrrhula) had flown over onto the neighbours cherry tree and delighted all of us for quite some minutes!
Lastly leaving a client yesterday I looked up to see for the second time in my life in this area 5 buzzards (Buteo buteo) flying together. Spring is certainly in the air!