Swans

A pair of swans have taken up residence on our local swimming pond. As swans are birds of habit and mate for life, they are probably the same pair that I watched this time last year. The pond, which in the summer was full of local families swimming and laughing, now only has my two swans floating serenely across its surface, breaking the reflections of the trees. But Winter is coming, the first snow has fallen, the pond will soon ice over and they will be gone again. I do not know where and would welcome thoughts on the matter.

I do so adore watching them. They bring back a very early memory from my childhood, of when we lived in the mill flat beside a pond. In the morning I would eat my toast, but leave the crusts, so that my mother and I could feed them to the two swans that lived on the millpond. I would have been aged about two at the time. There is something about my village and South Bohemia more generally that has the effect of triggering old memories, nearly always good ones. When I first came here to look at the house, it was not the house that resonated so strongly with me but the children's den in the trees and the hopscotch squares chalked on the tarmac outside the gate. It was like stepping back fifty years.

Spring

I am due my annual post about the wonders of Czech spring and so here it is. As always Spring has exploded here. One minute there is a pile of snow in my yard and the grass is brown and apparently dead, the next I am getting a suntan and watching the grass grow (nearly a centimetre in one day in fact) and contemplating when I will have to get the mower out.

The local birdlife is skittish with lovemaking - the male redstarts are busy chasing each other and the peregrine falcons that nest on the cliff of Cesky Krumlov Castle are mating in the trees under the walls. The spring flowers are appearing overnight - the primroses, the purple buttercup, violets, butterburr flowers on their stalks - and now I have just noticed even some blossom on a bush.

As I walk up the hill to the village I find the Czech Spring has put a spring in my foot ;-)

Birdwatching

One of the advantages of the snow and the Czech winter is that you can actually see all those small birds you could only hear during the other seasons. Flocks of birds swoop into the bushes outside our house where they chatter and fight. The need to feed on whatever berries and seeds remain overrides any fear they have of humans. Instead of flying off as I draw near they ignore me. The other day I opened the bedroom window to watch as two blue tits raided the eaves for insects. They were so close I could have reached out and touched them.

The bare trees and hedges reveal their secrets such as this nest. Nests are so well hidden in the summer that you can pass within a few feet and not see them. But now the little hat of snow highlight their existence, so much so that it is now one of my pastimes on the train journey to Cesky Krumlov to count bird nests in the trees that line the track.

An Enterprising Woodpecker.

Please forgive the rather bad photo, it was taken through a misty window. I have been watching this chap for some weeks now. He or she comes regularly to investigate the cracks between the tiles on the barn next door and in the barn wall. Why peck at the frozen bark of the local trees, when you can have insects in ready-made cracks?

The barn is a real attraction for the local birds. I can stand at my window and watch nuthatches, redstarts, treecreepers, bluetits and more feasting on the insect buffet offered by the old barn. Allowing the bird life to come to me certainly beats wandering around in the cold weather clutching a pair of binoculars.

More Swallows

What is it about this beautiful place that allows me to find nature's treasures? I am sure that it happens at home in England too, but that my ears and eyes are stopped by the roar of modern life.

I spent an hour today watching the swallows. I blogged about them last time and the spectacle is just getting larger. It is as if all the area's swallow population has descended on our small village, hosts and hosts of them. Sometimes they gather on the phonewires, sometimes in the silver birch by the village cross, and then most spectacular of all are the times when they pirouette over the roofs and orchards. This is freeform flying, they dodge and circle, drop and rise. They skim the surface of the village pond, dipping their wings. I have been here three summers and never seen anything like this.

Salamander came to visit me and as we left the village we had to stop the car by the cross to gaze at the swallow hordes. On the side of one house swallows were dotted presumably clinging to the rough plaster, the telephone wires were like the stems of my neighbour's red currants heavy with little black and white birds, while more far more swirled overhead. We went to the village near Salamander's lake house, it felt quite empty, there were only three or four swallows to be seen.

How Little Things Grow

It is strange to come back to the Czech republic after a few weeks away in the UK. Everything has grown, the grass I so carefully scythed is now at least knee deep. The baby swallows, which when I left were still chirruping at their frantic parents from their nests in the barn, every morning now perch on the telephone wires like strings of black and white pearls. A few still have some downy feathers, but all can fly and swoop. I presume they probably can catch flies most of the day, but the telephone wires act as a feeding station in the morning, with the parents diving in and hovering in front of their young one's open beaks.

And then there is Salamander's cat Lilly. A few week's ago I held her easily in my hands, now she is long and lean and quite the little princess. She comes and goes and is absolutely certain that the world revolves around her and she is not wrong. After a false start she seems to have recognised me again, and sucker that I am, I spend a lot of time stroking her and scratching her under her chin. After all what else have I to do with my time?