Firsts.

And second and third firsts, too!
Here we go - my first blogpost - I'm writing this with a pinch of trepidation and a large helping of grin!
Trepidation? It's a bit like a first date, the first blogpost - you never quite know what you've let yourself in for.
And the grin?  Well, today I saw my first hobby on The Reserve, and then later on three more from the Near Hide - a flock, a second first!  


So - what else is there to recall about a Sunday visit in early May, which began with a FoHESC working group, and became a day of first, second and third firsts?  
Apart from the very pleasant and informative company of Friends, there were red-legged partridges (another HESC first for me), and sparrowhawks high up with buzzards; there were skylarks and kestrels over the fields when we were working, and later on a muntjac and a reed bunting to watch when we rested.  Earlier, the black tern flew in (just for us it seems) and out, and the blackcaps, blackbirds and garden warblers swelled the Hanson Orchestra...  


In the afternoon I spent an indulgent few hours more away from real life. A sedge-warbler flew out of cover to sit and warble in full view whilst I sat in the full sun. On the boardwalk a long-tailed tit flew by carrying a feather and I watched their nest I'd spotted last week, hoping to see them going in and out again as they had before. The martins and swallows and swifts swarmed over the lake; black cormorants were sitting statuesqely amongst the herons' nests in the trees and white egrets grouped across the lake from them, reminding me of a game of draughts....


In the hedges the gorse flowers smelled of coconut after the sun had warmed them, and everywhere the comfrey seemed to have grown another few centimeters in a very few hours. That's the problem with HESC - it makes time vanish...


And as for my last 'first'? It was to be brief - I'll aim for that one next time :)