At the end of a day spent doing laundry and general housework, it’s always lovely to take the girls for a walk at Farnham Heath. If you time it right, the slowly sinking sun casts streaks of warm summer sunset through the trees.
Particularly good was the fact that the rain had stopped. A pesky rain which came and went all through the day. It was unclear when the weather would be clear for any length of time as clouds were replaced by blue sky with long stretches between.
There wasn’t any big winds. The kind that bring the clouds then shoves them away after a good drenching. No, the day felt quite still so I can only assume that the winds were high up in the sky, not bothering to touch us on the ground.
Unlike the poor gold finch that did a little more than ‘touch’ the plate glass of the extension.
Mirinda found the poor thing. It was lying on the terrace, tiny wings folded in at its sides, eyes almost closed, beak open. It appeared completely lifeless but, just in case, we decided to put it out of harms way. That way if it woke from whatever coma it was in, it could just fly off.
The usual suspects when it comes to crashing into our glass are generally pigeons of various types. They hit the glass with an almighty whack, fall to the terrace, shake their heads a bit and look around with a greater idiotic intensity than usual. Then they walk about a bit, clearly in a daze, before flying away. Pigeons may be stupid but they sure are tough.
Not so the poor little gold finch.
I carefully put it on the terrace glass table. There appeared to be no life in the tiny body. We left it there.
Each time I walked by, I checked and it remained exactly as I had left it. After a few hours, I decided it was definitely dead. Then, I was walking from my office back into the house, just before we headed for the Heath and it was gone.
There was no sign of it anywhere. No feathers, no blood, nothing. The table was empty.
I searched around the terrace but the bird was gone. Completely. Mysteriously.
There was no evidence of a cat. In fact I’d be surprised if there was given they don’t like the dogs and tend to stay clear of our garden. I guess it could have been the peregrine falcon but from what I’ve read, they tend to take birds mid-flight. I’m not convinced they prefer them already dead. Where’s the sport in that?
And it definitely wasn’t the girls. Though they have never climbed onto a table and taken anything, I moved the chairs away to be safe. I guess Freya could have jumped that high (she has jumped as high as the sink in the laundry, so it’s possible) but I think I’d have heard the commotion given I was in my office.
The only, logical exlanation is that the bird was seriously knocked out. I mean to a comatose degree. It just lay there. Kind of like the Norwegian Blue. Then it woke up and flew away.
Of course, if I was the religious type I’d say it was a miracle. That god looked down and took pity on the poor little birdie and breathed life back into its tiny little lungs. Because god does that sort of thing while letting humans die from various awful things.
But I’m not the religious type.
And speaking of the girls…I took this photo of them this morning because it’s cute. I also took it because, normally, Emma would have moved away rather than have Freya use her as a pillow.
