This afternoon Jackie drove me to Eyeworth Pond and back to watch the birds.
Golden gorse glowed in the sunshine on Hinchelsea Moor and many others.
The deciduous trees, like this oak, are all filling with foliage.
Walkers along the Rhinefield Ornamental Drive
gave scale to the giant redwoods.
Mandarin ducks are not native to UK, but we now have a feral population which originates from escapees from collections. These two males brightened an otherwise dull Eyeworth Pond.
Birders tend to place nuts and other food on the posts of the gate to the woodland footpath. A moss-covered log has recently been added. The blue tits, a coal tit, a nuthatch, chaffinches and sparrows were extremely busy today swooping to pick up and dart off with nutriment for the babies in their nearby nests.
A pair of sparrows left a tardy chaffinch on the ground beneath the post upon which they filled their beaks, debating who should set off first. Although not up to his flying bird sequence the last of these pictures is a nod to Tootlepedal.
Alongside Cadnam Lane a couple of pigs have joined
the grazing ponies and recumbent cattle now fertilising the greens alongside Cadnam Lane
One pony demonstrated its ungainly rise from the ground;
a small Shetland was definitely having a bad hair day.
This evening we dined on succulent chicken Kiev; Lyonnaise potatoes with lashings of onions; red cabbage cooked with butter and red wine; and crunchy carrots and cauliflower. Jackie finished the Sauvignion Blanc, while I drank the last of the Carménere.