Bradford-on-Avon and Birds

After a very busy but enjoyable few months, my last two 'summer' visitors went home yesterday and I'm getting back to the short contemporary novel I'm close to completing. As a way of getting myself in the mood for writing I thought I'd blog briefly about yesterday's trip to Bradford-on-Avon, just a few miles from Bath. In the late 18th and early 19th Centuries, Bradford was a mill town. The view below is taken from the bridge. The large building reflected in the Avon was once a mill. Built in 1875 on the site of an earlier mill, it has been converted into retirement flats.


Bradford is on the River Avon but it is also on the Kennet and Avon Canal. The photo below was taken at the Canal Wharf, a short walk from the town centre.


The towpath was a little muddy but we managed to walk along it. Thankfully the rain held off enabling me to take the photo below without having to juggle with a brolly.


What's great about Bradford is the abundance of little shops and cafes. Of course, we went in one to partake of a pot of tea and a baguette. The name had me wondering why my favourite cafes always seem to have the word 'horse' in their names. The one in Bradford is called the 'Scribbling Horse' and there's another in Dorchester (Dorset) called 'The Horse with the Red Umbrella'.

From horses to birds. At the end of August I posted a blog about garden birds, or rather the absence of them in our garden. Well, apart from the most fleeting of flock visits (ten minutes perhaps), for the blackbirds to eat a few hawthorn berries and the families of sparrows to check out their old nesting sites in the eaves of a neighbour's house, our feathered friends are still absent. Their visits always seem to take place after a cold, wet day. They eat very little from the bird table and are gone almost before I've noticed they've arrived. I haven't had to buy any bird food for about three months. It'll be interesting see what their numbers are like in the spring.

The Birds are Back!

It has always been a mystery to me why, towards the end of summer, garden birds vanish from urban areas. I've learned that, like guest house proprietors, they take their holidays in the autumn, either going to stay in the country or flying south to journey abroad to the sun.

Our small Wiltshire garden was abandoned some six weeks ago, leaving only collar doves and magpies to squabble over the remaining resources. Apart from one flashmob display by a flock of blue, great and long-tailed tits, small birds have stayed away, until now!

The RSPB website explains that after their young have fledged, the knackered parents moult. Being more vulnerable to predators, they keep a low profile and remain quiet. Also, there are better pickings in the countryside. Not today however. They're back, but for how long? There I was at 8am having my breakfast overlooking the garden when they all homed in on our hawthorn trees - a family of sparrows, a veritable treasure of flighty blackbirds and some blue tits. On RSPB advice, I've been keeping a little fresh food and water in my feeder so there was something for them.

Their visit might have something to do with the weather. It's been very wet of late, and the nights - particularly last night - chilly. Insects probably aren't as active in the rain and cold hence the scouring of the Wiltshire gardens for food. Twenty minutes was all I had of them and now they've gone again, along with their muted chatter, back to Farmer Giles's fields.