Will’s World: A day in the life of a lesser-spotted birdwatcher
Will Evans © Richard Stanton When you’re young you dread the very idea of being middle-aged, imagining that it will consist entirely of an endless stream of bills, rapidly greying hair, and the ferrying of unruly children around the country.
And do you know what? It does.
But fear not, youngsters, because I’ll tell you about something that is really cool about this period of life that you can start eagerly looking forward to: birdwatching.
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About the author
Yes, you read that right, I have become a Middle-Aged Farmer With Binoculars.
It’s crazy how fast it happens; you spend your entire youth pretty much indifferent to our little feathered friends and then one day, just like that, everything changes.
You find yourself getting ridiculously excited about even the briefest glimpse of anything from a great tit to a common shag (If you don’t already know what they look like, though, be very careful when googling them).
Enrichments
The fun doesn’t stop there, however. You also get to buy a few things to further enhance the experience.
A bird feeding station to go in the garden – which you site within view of your kitchen window, to add to that essential middle-aged, middle-class vibe – and of course, a good sturdy pair of binoculars to complete the look.
What could possibly be more edge-of-your-seat, I ask you.
We have a family of woodpeckers who live in an oak tree across the field, who regularly grace us with their glorious presence.
I enjoy their visits particularly, as not only do I get to marvel at their beautiful colours, speed and persistence, but I also get to tell my doubtless riveted daughters how to spot the difference between the female and the male.
I only wish that I smoked a pipe, so I could knowingly point with the stem of it as I dispense my fatherly wisdom.
Magic mow-ments
But wait until I tell you about this. On New Year’s Eve we sat around the table as a family and discussed our favourite moments and highlights of the year.
Various days out, holidays and personal triumphs were all thrown into the ring, but there was only one for me.
On 9 June (yes, it’s so exciting that I remember the exact date) I was mowing in one of our fields next to the River Dee.
Perhaps five years ago I’d seen nothing less than a curlew there, and I’ve looked out for others ever since.
© Anne Coatesy/Adobe Stock
Well, this time, I was driving along when I saw one, and then another, gracefully descend into the grass about 100m in front of me.
God, they’re beautiful. I don’t know what it is about them in particular, but they absolutely elevate my soul.
I left a wide berth around where they’d landed and carried on for a while, before eventually stopping the tractor to watch for a few minutes.
Chick thrills
What followed was genuinely breathtaking for me, and I’m grinning as I recall it now; to start with, one of them flew a short distance away and they began to call to each other.
That sound. That wonderfully evocative and haunting sound. I practically dad-danced on the spot!
But then the best bit. A well-grown chick hopped out of the remaining grass in the field, alongside its mother, and they tentatively headed across the rows of cut grass and into the foliage on the riverbank together.
I can’t adequately find the words here to describe the genuine elation I felt that day, or tell you how many times I’ve thought about it since, wondering if the chick survived.
But I know one thing: their appearance made my year.