|
Three of the reasons I love working at Feathers.
1. Astonishment
A customer (lets call her Catherine) came it to say her binoculars were a bit *fuzzy*
I checked them out and told her they seemed fine to me, she looked through - “oh yes! that’s better”
One minute later she said they had gone *fuzzy* again. Once more I had a peep through and found them perfect. After a very strange exchange of words I realised that she
didn’t know you needed to adjust the focus when moving from an object some distance away to one a couple of meters in front of you………YES! I did take the mickey and yes,
she did smack me.
2. Laughter
When I told a customer (lets call him Adrian) that I was working all over the Easter holiday he said he would probably spend most of the time sitting in his garden drinking
Gin & Tonic, slightly agitated I told him it would be nice if he brought me one, the following day he and his lovely lady wife woofed into the shop with a Gin & Tonic (with lemon)
on a silver tray………I was flabbergasted, what a lovely gesture……….YES! I did sell the tray.
3. Love
I received a phone call from a customer who I had known since I started at the other place some 12/13 years ago, she phoned to say goodbye………YES! I cried.
The month of April has been very quiet bird wise on the feeders both here in the nature area and at home. I think there is a lot of natural food available and all our little
visitors are taking advantage, Joe and I have seen many of the Tits and Finches doing their *Flycatcher* impression, making short ambush attacks catching whatever flies past,
consequently thing have been quiet in the shop, this does however give the Joe bloke the opportunity to tidy up the place, do the accounts and keep the website up to scratch,
it also allows me to do a bit of birding around the farm.
Some of you may know that Joe is getting married this month, and to my astonishment, Joe’s lack of experience and Char’s absolute bewilderment,
Joe has asked me to be his best man. Now, I have attended quite a few marriages (mostly my own) and I can say without a doubt it is not my favourite way of spending a Saturday,
I insisted on my last few marriages to be arranged early morning so if they didn’t work out I hadn’t wasted the whole day. I did suggest as a wedding gift I could take Joe away
birding in Africa with me but sadly because Char thought she should go along as well I abandoned that idea.
I then came up with the very generous idea of a two week honeymoon
in The Gambia, after all the strains and stresses of getting married I would have thought she would have jumped at this wonderful offer, again she thought she should go as well so
that put an end to that.
It is understood that when I do the Beast Man’s speech I should be on my best behaviour, I am not allowed to swear, being rude in any way is a definite no no and wearing
a pretty little summer frock is completely out of the question………………………We shall see.
The lovely Yvonne and her old man David are kindly taking care of the shop on the day of the wedding for us on the 21st. David is a volunteer at Rye Harbour so he will be
able to help you if you do pop in with a query. Yvonne is magic on the till so all should be well. Talking of Rye Harbour they have their festival from the 28th May - 5th June, stacks going
on, do try and get down there, more information HERE .
Among the many birds breeding around the shop is this Mistle Thrush, it’s nest is in an Oak tree in the car parking area. The House Martins have returned from Africa,
6 or 7 are entertaining us with their noisy flight acrobatics. We have at least two pairs of Blackcaps nesting nearby, sadly the Long Tailed Tits failed with their nest building.
I have done a little quiz thing in this months What's On magazine, we are offering a prize of a £20 voucher to the winner so do please have a go. Many thanks to all those who posted
their photographs to us, you can see them here. Also, Joe took this picture of a Great Spotted Woodpecker in the nature area last week, I love this shot….
Allan
Birds of a Feather
With the list well up in to the 70's now, any new species are added with great excitement. Much to our surprise, this month saw another 3 birds to the list! Most people believe
that I do all the work and Allan does very little... well you're all right, but occasionally I take some time off myself to do a bit of birding. On the 2nd April I took a wander down
to the river. The week before, Tom, one of the farmers, showed me where the Kingfishers have previously nested so I thought I'd check the holes for any activity. On my way along I flushed a male
Mandarin out from the water, this distinctively colourful duck is now becoming more common after being introduced to Britain from China. Look out for this magnificent bird at
any large sized pond with established Oak trees nearby as it will nest in a large hole in the tree and is, surprisingly, a fan of acorns that have fallen in to the water!
The next day, a Sunday, Allan was showing a customer over to the Nature Area and when sitting in the hide he noticed a bird strolling up the road. Creeping out of the hide to get a better view, Allan was able
to confirm his first thought that it was in fact a Red-legged Partridge. One of our good customers, known to us as 'Normal', has a few of these fantastic looking birds that visit
his work in a rather built up area, so we were pleased to finally see one here. Finally, the following week, a female Lesser Redpoll visited our new all singing, all dancing *pink*
niger feeder in the Nature Area. We knew these wonderful winter visitors had been seen locally so were waiting patiently for one to arrive. Unfortunately, although she hung around for
half an hour or so, there has been no sign of her since. None-the-less, we've made it to 79 now, who knows what the 80th bird will be!
Joe
|
