Spring Again

Finally…it’s spring again!

I don’t know why, but as I get older winters seem to get longer and more depressing. The weather this year hasn’t been particularly severe, but it just feels as though it’s been a grey, gloomy drag for months. Never mind! I can put all those gloomy thoughts behind me as a new spring gets under way. Here’s the first of this years reports from my local pond, where the wildlife is busy already.

As well as a few pictures, this week’s post has a first – video footage shot on my trusty iPhone. How exciting, video come to my blog only 120 years after after the invention of moving pictures.

Here come the ducks!

As usual the ducks are first out of the starting blocks with their new offspring. While out walking Bruce the dog earlier this week, we spotted this very young brood of ducklings. They were probably less than two days old old when I saw them and a couple of days later they were happily taking to the water.

The ducks are getting in on the act with the first brood of the year. These are two or three days old.

It’s Swan Time

The swans are always a few weeks behind the ducks when it comes to hatching their eggs, but the pair that nest on the pond have already begun their preparations. Earlier this week I stood just a few feet away from this beautiful creature and filmed it building the nest. The nests are wonderful, complex pieces of engineering, about four or five feet in diameter.

Here’s the finished nest. They are solidly built and in the next week or so the pen, (female swan), will lay anything up to seven eggs, which take between five to six weeks to hatch. Once the eggs are hatched the swans will stay at the pond for a few days and then migrate to the river to rear their cygnets.

The new nest, lovingly built by the swans will be filled with eggs in the next few days.

I’m always impressed by the hard work and dedication of the swans. They work together as a team to build the nest and, once the eggs are laid, they take turns to sit on them until they hatch. I’ll be back to photograph them in a few days, but here’s one last picture of one of the swans relaxing after all their hard work.

One of the local swans having a quick stretch by the side of the pond. Soon the pair will be nesting, so there won’t be much time to take a break.