Wednesday 7 January 2009

A "murmuring of starlings" for New Year!

May i wish everyone that comes across my posts a happy and prosperous new year. I hope that the credit crunch/recession doesn't treat you too badly.

I had a fairly quiet family Christmas this year. No major expensive presents because of the financial situation. Saying that we didn't miss the lack of gifts one bit and had a lovely relaxed time.

We spent a day and night at my sister-in-laws in Somerset over the holiday and had a great get together. We have visited them several times now at New Year and as they live right out in the country, it has become a sort of tradition for us all to enjoy a really long hard walk. This year we parked the cars in one of Somerset's nature reserves and walked through the reserve and on until we were at Glastonbury where we had a refreshingly hot drink before retracing our steps back to our parked cars.

On the way back we were privileged to witness the arrival of millions of starlings returning at dusk to roost in the reed beds overnight at the nature reserve. Their display before landing was quite spectacular. It was like a swarm with different moving clouds going this way and that. I'm told that when they fly together in such large numbers it is known as a "murmuring of starlings". Quite delightful.

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