Depending on where you live, today may mark the start of a new lockdown, but depending on your behaviour, it may not make very much difference to what you actually do.
Because of caring duties for two mothers in their 90s our household hasn’t got out much since March and we have got accustomed to a new normal; zoom calls, more money left at the end of the month, more deliveries and less shopping, much more time in the garden and much less time at Stanwick Lakes.
There are three main differences for me, between this lockdown (should we call it a lockdown really?) and the previous one. First, this lockdown is less stringent than the first: schools are open, more of the countryside is open – see here for details of what is expected from you. Second, we have all adjusted and the second of anything is usually less worrying, less unnerving, sometimes less exciting and probably better carried off than the first. Lockdown? Done that, got the T-shirt! But third, this is autumn not spring, and for a naturalist that makes a big difference.
Whereas I could look forward to seeing the arrival of spring avian migrants from my garden (not as well as from my local birding patch I admit) it’s not the same in autumn. Yesterday morning, sitting in the garden with ice from the first night’s frost on the ground, Skylarks flew over in small groups (a very autumnal sighting) and on most days now a few Redwings and or Fieldfares will fly over and those are the signs of autumn. There is almost no bird song, just the very welcome occasional Robin, whereas Lockdown1 was an opportunity to listen more closely to a wide range of songs, even in this urban garden, and to immerse oneself in the local dawn chorus every day. Whereas in Lockdown1 I noticed the changes in our apple tree from leaves to buds to flowers (and on to a wonderful crop in the autumn) now all I can do is note the ever smaller number of leaves on the tree – it’s not quite the upward trajectory of wild hope that Spring delivers.
But it’s OK really. I will keep a Lockdown2 birdlist and probably tell you about it each week. It won’t, probably, be as much fun as the Spring one but I have grown more hefted to my back garden this year and i am determined to continue to spend time sitting in it, thinking of things, and looking up to the skies and listening for the musical calls of Skylarks as they pass overhead.
Pleased to see that it has formally been stated this time that volunteering work for a charity (eg a bird survey) is officially in the ‘allowed’ category for reasons to leave home, meaning that many of us who have nature resevre workparties to do can continue with them assumign the overseeing body or charity decides that its OK….
That was, as far I was concerned, one of the serious grey areas in the spring version
Hefted Mark? Should be in winter quarters by now. Keep your woolly coat on.
We need a proper six month lockdown, with pretty much all movement outside the home banned except for emergency services and deliveries. And with the latter it should really be the armed services delivering food parcels, not some poor sod on minimum wage and a zero hours contract. Six. Months. Everyone. Inside.