More chiffchaffs have begun to arrive in the past few days, and they move through the trees that line the footpaths, singing, feeding, then singing again. A rain shower falls, but soon passes. The Brooks seem comparatively deserted now. The thousands of ducks that wintered here are gone, leaving some teals, shelducks, gadwalls, mallards and Canada and greylag geese. Four black-tailed godwits – medium-sized waders, with tall legs and long, straight beaks – wander along a water channel, dipping their beaks into the water to probe the mud below. All of them are beginning to show breeding colours – warm russet-orange necks and breasts. They will soon be on their way north, too. Some of the godwits that winter here were ringed in Iceland, where many of them breed.
A male blackcap flies up, out of a bramble bush just in front of me, with a pillow of wool-like down in its beak for a nest. It perches and sings, somehow still holding on to its precious cargo. The song is stuttering and scratchy, and short, but ends with a phrase of more tuneful notes. It sounds as though the bird is still practising. He slinks into the bushes and sings again.
I see a large white bird flying in the distance, and recognise it as a great white egret. A much rarer visitor than the little egrets, it’s about the size of a grey heron. It flies languidly out of sight, and I decide to follow it, to see if I can get a closer view from another hide. Sure enough, I find it wading through reed-lined pools, its long, snake-like neck kinked in an S-shape. It stalks the water’s edges, stabbing down with its large yellow bill, snatching at fish and amphibians.
The wind blows ripples across the pools, laid out like large, flat pieces of grey metal among the dark grass and reed. More rain falls. The lapwings are undeterred. They whoop and whee in looping aerobatics, and skylarks rise into the air, fluttering their wings, singing breathlessly. Three skylarks chase each other, low over the grass, their broad tails flashing white edges. The sun breaks through and warms my face and, for a moment, it feels like spring.
