Dove of Spring

This is not the first collared dove I have blipped, and I'm sure it won't be the last. I love these birds so much, they're such beautiful, gentle unassuming creatures. We have a pair in the garden all the time now, and they are besotted with each other (pardon my anthropomorphism).

I'm keeping my fingers crossed they will return to nest in the Bay tree. The last pair attempted to nest four times there in 2009, and by the third try had got the hang of it. The male lost his mate in early 2010 and was on his own for some months, until finally a new female arrived. She sat on the old nest for a couple of days, but clearly it wasn't to her liking, and they crossed the road to the neighbour's tall conifers.

There are signs of Spring in this picture. The buds are fattening on the Gingko in which the dove is perched, and the finer twigs of the Amelanchier behind has flower buds fattening for their annual brief but glorious show in a couple of weeks time.

It's a late blip tonight, as Brokenbanjo and I have spent another evening in the Tower of Sweat & Chalk, sometimes known as the Kendal Climbing Wall. BB is getting better and stronger all the time, while I am making incremental progress. It pays not to look around at the hulks swarming like spiders up the main wall, it makes me feel wholly inadequate. Still if it gets me fit enough to do a few classic routes on proper rocks in the great outdoor playground of the Lake District, then it will be worth enduring a few more visits. And BB is keen, so with Simon being preoccupied with his paternal duties, here is a new climbing partner to get me out there again.

On a sad note, another sign of Spring today - the first flat hedgehog on the road leaving Arnside. It always upsets me to see them, the more so knowing how easy they are to avoid on a 40 mph road. Some people are just oblivious, or simply don't care. Wifie witnessed this a couple of years ago when she stopped to try and rescue a brood of shelducks that were being walked down to the estuary by their parents. They had got stuck between the road wall and the crag on the opposite side. Even as she and another rescuer were shepherding them to safety, people were ploughing through them regardless. In the event though most of them did make it.