Fall In! Eyes Front!

These black-headed gulls were on parade in their winter, Number Two uniforms. They should really be called brown-headed gulls because in summer they sport chocolate-coloured hoods.

People other than ornithologists and birders tend to call all gulls seagulls but that would be a definite misnomer in this case. These birds are commonly seen inland, quite often in the company of lapwings, which gives them the name peewit gull. Their summer aerial manoeuvres when chasing flying ants is where another name, tumbling gull, originated. Their scientific name means laughing gull.

My daughter, granddog, Ollie dog and I had a lovely, if quite cold, cross- country walk this morning. It makes us happy to see our dogs so obviously enjoying themselves.