Thursday 5 November 2009
With the dawning of another nice day we did the same as yesterday and got as many of the birds not on official demonstration flown early. It bodes well for December when we close as I would like to get all the birds done early so we can concentrate on other jobs and get them finished. It was however much windier than yesterday, so some of the less experienced birds struggled a little, but not the peregrine, she fair streaked through the sky!
My Long-eared Owl did not behave yesterday, he went straight up into one of the walnut trees, and came down OK, but when asked to cross the flying ground he turned back into the same tree, and there he stayed, so we had to rethink the demonstration, the Harris Hawk would have eaten him, and probably Hemp (Eurasian Eagle Owl) would have done as well had he moved at the wrong time, and the peregrine definitely would have caught him in flight. So we put on the Kites, as they were highly unlikely to do him any harm, and they shut him up – not a peep for the whole time they were flying, we were about to do the Buzzard on a line, when he decided he had had enough of these strange flying birds and he legged it (OK winged it) up towards his enclosure, Robin picked him up at the gate.
Talking of Hemp, I did have to laugh today, I was flying her and she flies Very low to the ground, well Sedge was lying in the grass waiting for me to finish and he did not see her coming. She literally flew maybe an inch above his head, and has a wingspan of 6 feet, so that is like a Lancaster bomber going an inch over your head (they are huge!). Sedge did a somersault and yelped and ran off, I just fell about laughing much to his embarrassment! I wish it had been filmed!
It always annoys me that no TV company will make a long term serious about daily life here, it is a damn sight more interesting that some of the reality TV that you see, and certainly never dull.
I wonder why it is that on some nights you go to bed and sleep just completely evades you for no apparent reason. I had one of those last night and was still wide away at 4.00am. I really should get up and work, but instead I read. And now of course I am very tired, I am hoping tonight will not be a repeat and if it is, I will get up and work.
I have to go and get my car later, we are going to see if it overheats again, I have no idea why it does, so I am going to try it out going to a lecture near Coventry, I am hoping that if it does break down, it does so on the way back, not on the way there………………….
As I drove my car back this evening, it was dark and I could see lights from houses dotted through hedges and trees and along the roadside. It reminded me of so much. Of how depressing it was to drive back into the property in south carolina in the dark and wet, to a miserable and unwelcoming double-wide trailer, what a difference from what I had been used to. Then when I was living in the steel barn at Eardisland before I got yet another trailer, I used to drive back from Hereford where the quarantine/temporary housing for the birds was. I would drive through similar country lanes, looking at the lights in the various cottages and houses along the way and think how lucky they were to have a proper home; I had been without one for, by the time I got back here, over four years. I know there are many people out there who probably would have liked a trailer to live in, I am not sure they would have enjoyed the steel barn in a wet summer and cold winter as it was particularly unpleasant, but I had had such a nice home that I had worked very hard to keep and not having one was very tough, particularly as I was always concerned about the birds and the dogs that I was dragging through the same experience.
This drive however I thought, I am going home – to a proper home, with lamps and furniture and a fire to light on a dark wet late autumn evening. The birds are safe and snug and the dogs are waiting for me, it was a good feeling.
My Long-eared Owl did not behave yesterday, he went straight up into one of the walnut trees, and came down OK, but when asked to cross the flying ground he turned back into the same tree, and there he stayed, so we had to rethink the demonstration, the Harris Hawk would have eaten him, and probably Hemp (Eurasian Eagle Owl) would have done as well had he moved at the wrong time, and the peregrine definitely would have caught him in flight. So we put on the Kites, as they were highly unlikely to do him any harm, and they shut him up – not a peep for the whole time they were flying, we were about to do the Buzzard on a line, when he decided he had had enough of these strange flying birds and he legged it (OK winged it) up towards his enclosure, Robin picked him up at the gate.
Talking of Hemp, I did have to laugh today, I was flying her and she flies Very low to the ground, well Sedge was lying in the grass waiting for me to finish and he did not see her coming. She literally flew maybe an inch above his head, and has a wingspan of 6 feet, so that is like a Lancaster bomber going an inch over your head (they are huge!). Sedge did a somersault and yelped and ran off, I just fell about laughing much to his embarrassment! I wish it had been filmed!
It always annoys me that no TV company will make a long term serious about daily life here, it is a damn sight more interesting that some of the reality TV that you see, and certainly never dull.
I wonder why it is that on some nights you go to bed and sleep just completely evades you for no apparent reason. I had one of those last night and was still wide away at 4.00am. I really should get up and work, but instead I read. And now of course I am very tired, I am hoping tonight will not be a repeat and if it is, I will get up and work.
I have to go and get my car later, we are going to see if it overheats again, I have no idea why it does, so I am going to try it out going to a lecture near Coventry, I am hoping that if it does break down, it does so on the way back, not on the way there………………….
As I drove my car back this evening, it was dark and I could see lights from houses dotted through hedges and trees and along the roadside. It reminded me of so much. Of how depressing it was to drive back into the property in south carolina in the dark and wet, to a miserable and unwelcoming double-wide trailer, what a difference from what I had been used to. Then when I was living in the steel barn at Eardisland before I got yet another trailer, I used to drive back from Hereford where the quarantine/temporary housing for the birds was. I would drive through similar country lanes, looking at the lights in the various cottages and houses along the way and think how lucky they were to have a proper home; I had been without one for, by the time I got back here, over four years. I know there are many people out there who probably would have liked a trailer to live in, I am not sure they would have enjoyed the steel barn in a wet summer and cold winter as it was particularly unpleasant, but I had had such a nice home that I had worked very hard to keep and not having one was very tough, particularly as I was always concerned about the birds and the dogs that I was dragging through the same experience.
This drive however I thought, I am going home – to a proper home, with lamps and furniture and a fire to light on a dark wet late autumn evening. The birds are safe and snug and the dogs are waiting for me, it was a good feeling.
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1 comments:
I have the same feeling, when I come home from my crappy job, 7 years of living on site in a caravan definatly takes its toll, there realy is no place like home.
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