I had a wonderful hour in the late afternoon watching the female muntjac deer in the garden. She was so relaxed and calm. She fed all round the pond, taking notice of the ducks nor they of her. She ignored the squirrel and although he takes a wide boundary, round the ducks, he was fearless of the muntjac, who made her way round the garden, slowly and meticulously. She ate all the new growth on the hardy geraniums, dozens of bright yellow daffodil heads, while hardly touching the snowdrops, but loved the new growth on the fatsia, rose petals and rosebuds were eaten vigorously, lower leaves from the apple tree were stripped and big fat buds on a rhododendron, were slowly snapped off and munched with obvious pleasure. She ended up feasting on the yew, which really surprised me as I thought all parts of the yew, with the exception of the soft outer part of the berry surrounding the seed, were poisonous. Eventually, she disappeared behind the greenhouse. She clearly is able to digest yew without absorbing any toxins, so suffers no adverse effects, I imagine.
The magpie continues daily to increase the size of her nest, collecting vegetation from our garden and the orchard at the end of it, also breaking off twigs from the birch tree. I have also noticed her stealing the twigs from both the pigeons’ nest and the now squashed squirrel dray.
The birch twigs are easily broken off and seem to be used by all the larger birds: crows, pigeons and magpies. Although we have jackdaws about, I have never noticed them collecting nesting material from anywhere.
At tea time, I was surprised to see nine cormorants fly over. They pass over at approximately the same time each day, but I have never seen more than six before.
Today was wet. Incessant rain fell all day and evening.
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