Every year I look out for the annual return of the Swifts and this year they've beaten me to it! I was pottering around in the garden, sowing vegetable seeds and chatting away to a visiting Robin when, by chance, I glanced up into the sky and saw, wheeling away, quite high up, the unmistakeable crescent shape of a Swift!
Seeing the swifts each year for the first time fills me with total joy and, grinning like an idiot, I rushed inside to inform TLH that they were back. I then checked back on last year's first-swifts-of-the-year posting and it was 1 May. Apparently the year before that, 2008, they arrived on 3 May, a good 10 days later than this year. I've no idea why this should be - perhaps this spring is warmer than in previous years so has tempted them up from Africa sooner? Who knows. I'm just pleased they're here, that's all.
[P.S. This post was going to be a tutorial on how to make blackberry vodka, but that will have to wait until later, possibly quite a few days later as tomorrow is my thirty-seventeenth birthday and I intend to drown in Margaritas first....]
[PPS. Is that picture of the orchid at the top too large? It seems nice but a bit hulking to me....]
12 comments:
I love swifts too, and I love this weather. Blackberry vodka sounds good too!
Ms Alienne - Swifts are bloody fab - they're like the dolphins of the air, just mucking about in great groups, chasing each other and squealing. Blackberry vodka almost as good, dead easy to do and make brilliant christmas presents.
We get some swifts here, but mostly huge flocks of swallows, though I haven't seen any yet. Your new header photo is beautiful!
Peevish - thank you for your kind comment about the photo. I intend to change the header pic with the season (more or less). This one is a closeup (which I then Helga'd) of an orchid on my sitting room window sill that has been flowering its little heart out for weeks now.
I've only seen 4 swifts so far today, so they must be arriving in dribs and drabs - I wonder if they fly all night from Africa and there'll be more tomorrow morning?
I swear that header photo (beautiful!) gets bigger every time I visit... :)
GMB - d'you know what? I think you might be right but Blogger seemingly dictates the size of the picture so there's not much I can do.
No swifts here and no swallows yet either - it doesn't seem like proper spring until they arrive either.
Love your hulking orchid - feel you could nestle up in it like the best kind of duvet.
Hi its been a busy 10 days or so and I'm just catching up on everyone's blogs that I follow.
Lucky you I haven't seen any as yet but like you I also keep an eye out for them.
I love the hulking orchid, its pretty.
A birthday coming, happy celebrations.
I'm off to catch up on your other posts.
So I get too busy to play on the Intarwebs for a couple of days and then when I come back you announce that you're about to have a birthday?! Well, have a great one then (don't even TRY to count the margaritas).
I love the colour of the orchid, but I do find it rather imposingly hulking - but it won't stop me from reading, no matter how big it gets!
Happy birthday honey.xxx. Will send lovely stuff when I get home.x
I was hanging out my washing Saturday (1 May) and suddenly heard the screaming of Swifts. Looked up and there were about 10 wheeling about. Made my day.
Paul in Reading - hello and welcome! Bloody fab, isn't it? I'm very tempted to get a tattoo of a couple of them but don't quite know where. I've decided that I would have one as my daemon (a la 'His Dark Materials').
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