Itchy-scratchy

Poor Bob is suffering the tiny, bitey, hoppy insects. It's only a couple of weeks since we last treated him, but they are clearly back aboard contrary to the professed length of effective life of the treatment. He hates them with a vengeance and he remembers exactly where they have hopped onto him, avoiding the spot or sprinting across it.

I can always rely on Bob to cheer me up. It was an anxious day waiting for positive news from Yorkshire, but the wait continues. And when I came home today, I found an adult male blackbird mortally injured in the garden. He died in my hands. At first I thought the injury was from flying into the glass doors, but then I saw the wound on his neck. It looks like it may have been a sparrowhawk, which might have slipped away unseen as I arrived. My fear is that it was this bird who has been in the garden since the winter and proved to be a model father to two broods of young ones. Today's bird didn't have the distinctive brown edge feathers to the wings and tail, but then all of our blackbirds have been moulting into their new feathers, and he may have lost the brown ones. I guess I shall know in a day or two if he doesn't turn up for the morning feed.

I'm afraid I won't be able to comment much tonight, but will try and catch up tomorrow.