Dusk

Our bedroom window opens up like a door and this week I’ve been enjoying sitting in my pyjamas, watching the valley as dusk falls. It’s been so still. I can hear the caws of the rooks in the trees behind our house as they settle down to roost. The undergrowth rustles in the wood at the bottom of the garden as some small mammal forages about. A robin has obliged my attempts to learn his song by vocally clearing his throat at every opportunity.

The thunderstorm that threatened arrived. It was thrilling to sit at the open window as the rain came down in sheets and lightening caused a shadow of the house to flash out across the garden. It wasn’t the blustery rain of a winter storm but the solid fresh torrent of a summer downpour. We thought Little Owl slept through it but the next morning she remarked on the sky “rumbling” in the night, so obviously not! Following this we’ve had the odd shower interspersed with sunny spells. The garden is looking decidedly perkier.

This week’s bird from Simon Barnes’ Birdwatching With Your Eyes Closed is the wren. Simon describes the key characteristics of a wren’s song as coming from low down (about knee high) and loud. Here’s the link for the wren’s song. I think I’m going to find it hard to tell it apart from the robin. Apparently it’s the trill that gives it away. Somewhere else I read that they also make a clicking noise, like two pebbles being knocked together. I’ve definitely heard that around our garden and wondered what it was. Something I’ve been trying to find out for ages is the origin of the term ‘jenny wren’, but I can’t find anything. A Northern Irish friend of mine had never heard the phrase. Any ideas?