Turf Wars

My sister joined Mum and me early today to come to Church with us.  It's our first Father's Day without our Dad, and we wanted to be together for it.  Sitting in Dad's usual place on the third pew from the front, I felt his presence particularly strongly this morning.  After our carvery lunch, we had tea and cake at home in the afternoon reminiscing about old times long past.  We remembered how Dad would often use his clean white cotton handkerchiefs to wipe off excess glue, putty or similar after doing D.I.Y. jobs.  Mum used to despair of it!

We stood by the patio doors looking out at the garden, which was a flurry of bird activity.  There were several Great Tit fledglings flitting about, and also Dunnocks popping in and out of a little bush and chasing each other around.   Then we saw a Song Thrush emerge from a large bush where I know there is a neat little Blackbird's nest inside, near the top.  It was followed by the little fellow in my blipfoto, which I think is a juvenile, and which stood still for ages on the wall looking lost and cheeping every now and then, while the adult Song Thrush was hotly pursued back and forth across the lawn by an angry Blackbird.  Many generations of Blackbirds have inhabited the garden, encouraged by Dad who used to feed them cake crumbs every tea-time - so I suppose they took exception when a family of Song Thrushes tried to move in.  My extra photo is another shot of the juvenile Song Thrush after it had finally moved along the wall.