Fairburn Ings...

Kipped in the car park at Fairburn Ings, another RSBP reserve, so I was ready to take a wander early this morning. The highlight was seeing a pair of great crested grebes, and their offspring. The young grebe was losing its downy feathers and developing the characteristic ear tufts, but, despite being almost full-size, it still needed feeding. The parents kept diving and coming up with sardine-sized fish which junior swallowed whole.

About twenty years ago I was walking around the lakes at Fairburn Ings, when a sizeable bird popped to the surface of the water, just a few feet away. I turned to the guy next to me and said “If I didn’t know better I’d swear that was a great northern diver”. He confirmed that’s what it was: a single bird that had taken up residence at the reserve for a few days. It certainly wasn’t a bird I’d ever expected to see in Yorkshire.

And twenty years before that, following a domestic argument, I found myself sitting in a hide at Fairburn Ings on Christmas Day morning. It took a couple of minutes to realise I wasn’t alone; a man was sitting in the shadows. “The house is full of women”, he said mournfully, “and they said I was in the way. So I thought I’d come here for an hour or two. But before I left, I grabbed this”. He produced a bottle of single malt whisky from the inside pocket of his coat, so, on a frosty winter’s morning, two refugees from the family home were able to toast each other’s health with something warming…

Pawnbroker closing down... and flags flying for England...