A mighty task complete!

Yes! Finally completed all the log splitting, creating something like 13 cubic metres of firewood for winter 2011-12. Well, not quite ALL the logs split - the very big and very awkward ones have been delightfully formed into a landscape "feature" down in the woodland glade to be! Maybe one or two will fall to the axe yet.

Simon asserting his macho credentials - cord-tastic!

Julia being deeply feminine in a glade - despite having a stinking cold

A gorgeous spring day today - lots flying about and buzzing - notably Brimstone, Small Tortoiseshell and Peacock butterflies, and a couple of Swallows. Also another new garden bird today - a Lapwing (at last) mobbing one of the local Buzzards over the wet fields to the west of us. And a day or two ago a Noctule bat was a garden tick at dusk as well.

Easter action

Post our return from the Morocco school trip, we had our good friends Chris and Jacky down from Norfolk to visit over the Easter weekend. It was great to catch up, and of course to enjoy a day at our bombsite...er....house. Rupert has been very busy smashing things up, but the corner has now been turned, with the bathroom now recognisable, and tiling imminent.

Despite his bad knee, Chris managed to be very helpful in the destruction of more logs, and added a great bird to the garden list (as he annoyingly did with Lesser Whitethroat back in Winchester 10 years ago!) - RED KITE! A very smart 1st winter wheeling about over the field and driftng north over Snails Lake.


Other new birds this week have been rather more predictable - Swallow, House Martin (but no Sand Martin yet - although they are "in" in numbers at the Lakes), Chiffchaff and (some quality here) a female Goldeneye overhead. Now up to 70 species! There are still a few Bramblings about, looking smarter by the day, as well as plenty of Reed Buntings looking resplendent, and regular visits from Great Spotted Woodpeckers. Even the Rooks tried their hand at feeding from the fat balls yesterday!

Tractor time - oh yeah!

Record shot of the Grey Heron which flew by today!

Oh yes - despite the splitting of about 2 more tons of Leylandii logs, and not one but two garden ticks (House Sparrow and Grey Heron - see above), the undoubted highlight today was the arrival of Tony the Tractor - a spiffing new John Deere X140 RSi Turbo Ghia VRS twin-cam Quattrovalvole Spyder GTX - and it's green!

Tractor-boy in serious masculine action

Boiler bombsite!

Julia went down to The Willows today - it's a bombsite! The old boiler is out, and the new one is installed. there's quite a lot of piping to be fixed, so all the floors are up, and there's carpet everywhere. We have to trust that things will start to look better soon.....

The old boiler has gone....

And here's the new one.

The good news is that things are happening in the garden - the Camellia is now firmly out.

Bits and pieces

Some frustratingly slow progress in recent days - too much work to do! Not real work - just school work.....

But, more logs have been split (only about 6-8 tonnes left....), wallpaper has been stripped in the dining room, and all is about ready for Rupert to get in, rip out our old boiler, and replace it with a shiny new one - mayhem just around the corner. And the lawn tractor shopping is going well, too. Watch this space.

And better still, two new birds for the garden list today - Greylag Goose and Golden Plover, both overhead, obviously! Now on 63, and spring is just around the corner - still no House Sparrow, Grey Heron or Lapwing, either.

Blitzkrieg on the biomass

A great day today - a slightly damp walk in the Forest with our good friends Geoff, Elaine, Tim and Gill, and yet another showaround of the "the estate" - which (outside) is barely recognizable now that Olly C has flattened all the Leylandii! Even a new garden bird in the form of (gasp) Pheasant.

In the woods - with our mates - and good ol' Kevin (now an amazing 15!)

The former front hedge....

....and where the back hedge once was!

Simon gets heavy with the new splitting maul

Logging time!

Some epic action going on in the garden today - Olly Cracknell and his crew are well underway bashing the 54 (count them) trees which need to be felled and grubbed out. Almost all are Leylandii, but there was also this rather hefty Eucalyptus - animated gif action time!

Olly C. gets to work....

TIMBER! Awesome!

Carnage down the west side of the garden

We had our "young personal friend" Josh Nightingale down at The Willows today - we all thoroughly enjoyed stacks of Redpolls, Siskins, Reed Buntings and Bramblings in the garden - and then went and topped up with even more of the same at the Woodland Hide on the HWT reserve.

There we also met up (by chance) with Gary Prescott - the famous Biking Birder who is going for a fantastic year-long bike around the UK, visiting all the RSPB and WW reserves (plus more besides!) and aiming for a new British record. He told us he was "inspired" by my own 2005 Hampshire Year List record, as well as Chris Mills 251 Ironman of Norfolk effort. Really glad to have met Gary - and we wish him all the best for the rest of the year!

The top bird of the day was a really good find - a Blashford patch tick and a proper inland Hampshire rarity - a cracking male Common Scoter on Ivy Lake, right in front of the Tern Hide. Result!

Half-term holiday home

At last, half-term has come! We chugged down to Blashford on Saturday after dropping in to see Guy & Carolyn in Chandlers Ford - all house bores now.... On arrival, Julia promptly dashed off for a yoga afternoon in Christchurch - Simon spent the afternoon finalising building/boiler details with Rupert Coutts, and did just a little local birding. We had an evening meal out in Ringwood, narrowly squeezing our way past numerous semi-clad young women out on Valentine's night dates with their (we thought) distinctly under-dressed boyfriends. Overnight camping was much more comfortable this time - better preparation!

Julia in no way resembling a vagrant

Sunday morning dawned cold but settled, and we enjoyed an hour's walk around the Reserve before hardly anyone else had arrived - no great surprises, but nice to see all the waterfowl in good light on millpond-like lakes. On the practical front, we did a few bits and pieces - kitchen door painted (15 individual windowettes to be glossed around - on each side!), brambles pulled up from the front garden, and (most importantly) an initial collection of willow withies collected and dumped in bucket of water - live fences, here we come!

The Withy Man

We did also have time to do a bit more photography - brace yourself!!!!

Grey Wagtail on Linbrook Stream

Pochard on a glassy lake

Greenfinches

Tits ahoy!

Male Brambling

Female Siskin

Long-tailed Tit

Goldfinch

Photo-phest!

Julia spent the day down at The Willows today, doing lots of useful jobs....well, photographing the birds, actually! But it's about time we had a few avian visitors on our blog - so here goes! All photos taken TODAY!

Redpoll

Brambling

Long-tailed Tit

Reed Bunting

Great Spotted Woodpecker

Treecreeper

Goldfinch

Jay

Blackbird

Dunnock

Robin

Great Tit

Nuthatch

Blackcap

Minor progress as spring is (possibly?) in the air

A fairly gentle day together at The Willows today, following a pretty busy one for Julia on Friday when she did stacks of gloss painting. On the practical side, all we did was hang the curtains in the sitting room, tinker with a few bits of paint, and change the light fitting in the hall - low key, really!

The nearly completed sitting-room - curtains to be updated soon!

But we also enjoyed a walk up from the house onto Rockford Common and back down by Moyles Court - finding the long-staying female Smew on Rockford Lake. We also saw plenty of Redpolls, Siskins and a few Bullfinches, plus "the usual" Goosander, Goldeneye and other wildfowl.

Back in the garden, a new peak was reached for Reed Bunting - nine! Also new in the garden were a couple of Siskins, plus Goldfinch, and we finally got around to birding Snails Lake from inside the front garden - easily adding Tufted Duck, Pochard, Mute Swan and Coot. The garden list is already up to a highly impressive 57....

Julia feasts on baked potatoes - new microwave in action