Our garden is very busy indeed just now. Greenfinches were feeding their young yesterday, and there are a couple of very querulous blackbird youngsters about. This morning a couple of young robins turned up; they seemed already quite adept at feeding themselves. Our blue tits are no longer flying back and forth to the nest box, so I imagine the young there have fledged, though we missed the event. The parents are visiting the fat ball feeder and then flying back into the woodland behind, so that I think is where the youngsters are, probably in the ivy that grows thickly around an old telegraph pole there.
I had to go down to the livestock market this morning, and was interested to find a pair of oystercatchers strolling about as if they owned the place. They seemed totally unfazed by our presence, and made no attempt to take flight. I also found a large piece of oystercatcher egg shell. Was this brought by one of the parent birds from a nest site? Is that nest site actually within the livestock market, or perhaps by the river which is not far away? Or was the eggshell evidence of a failed nesting attempt? Sadly, that is not unusual, oystercatchers being ground nesters and often choosing rather vulnerable situations.
Later, also at the market, I glimpsed a painted lady butterfly. These cannot survive a British winter (or for that matter, winter anywhere much in Europe), so they migrate to us from North Africa. Numbers are very variable, but sometimes you can get a "painted lady summer". Maybe this year will be one. I walked along by the river, where sand martins were busy, then back along the canal towpath, accompanied by damselflies throughout.
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