Notes from the valley

I was reminded of the brilliance of Richard Adams's Watership Down over Christmas, the BBC adaptation collided with mixed reviews but we at The Warren loved it. Rabbits themselves are not so common in the wider countryside today, disease the main culprit. One particular arch enemy of the rabbit, the Fox or Homba, can be heard barking and generally making an otherworldly racket at this time of year, as the dog seeks out the vixen in the hope of mating and settling down into an earth. Although widespread, the country fox is rarely seen, and my encounter last Sunday the 20th was one to remember. I had checked the water levels at Rockland Broad around 7.30am, and was in the process of retreating through the frozen scrub back to the main path when a bark stopped me in my tracks. Leaf litter and twigs snapped, a path was being ploughed in my direction. I took a step back, and a fox shot out in front of me. Panicked, he sprinted deeper into the brush and the last I heard for now was

No matter how many times I walk the well-trodden paths that criss-cross my local patch, nature can still throw up something new. At Surlingham Church Marsh early this morning, the temperature beginning to climb above freezing, I witnessed a pair of Jays mobbing a perched Common Buzzard. I have never seen this behaviour before, although from a Corvid of any kind not exactly unexpected. My presence appeared to be the final straw, the raptor taking flight and disappearing further into the small pine wood. Elsewhere on the reserve, a hunting female Marsh Harrier was hopefully a sign of things to come prior to Spring, and Siskins aplenty called overhead and amongst the Alders. Walking the holloway from the church down to the river, the first Snowdrops were braving the frozen ground and providing a welcome splash of purity and colour. This afternoon as the sky took on a golden tinge above the copse opposite, I took this as my signal to walk the marsh path down to the river. I was rewarded

In the time it took me to drive down the long uneven track to the enigma that is The Beauchamp Arms, the satellite Corvid roost had grown from zero to around 300 birds. A roughly even mix of Rooks and Jackdaws assemble on Claxton Marshes every evening during the Winter (currently around 15.30) and 50 minutes later a mass of circa 5000 birds have left for the giant roost at Buckenham Carrs north of the river. This was the first time I had made a clear note of timings, and was surprised by how quickly the meeting point goes from raucous to silent. In fact, an eerie quiet falls upon the avenue of trees around 16.00, and a lone cock Pheasant outcried the 1000s of Corvids perched on trees or loafing on the marshy ground beneath. What follows are a number of reshufflings as the restless birds take flight in small waves, taking a new branch to perch upon. Around 16.15, a false dawn as a splinter group takes a more purposeful flight only to loop round and return to the main group. Only at twe