Twitching

Earlier this year, when the almonds were in blossom, Heather was out walking when she noticed an eagle circling overhead. She had our cheap digital camera with her, and succeeded in snapping several small black dots in a clear blue sky.

Then she got lucky.

No one could ever call me a 'twitcher', though I am very interested in the nature around me, and I do like to know what it is that I have seen. Sadly, many of the birds I see go unrecognized, especially, the shy little brown ones hiding in bushes that fly fast and aren’t sparrows.

I am getting better though, as I am able to readily recognise the golden orioles that I surprise at the fig tree near the fuenta; the cuckoos and nightingales that announce the start of spring and the bee eaters and rollers that do the same for summer. I can now distinguish between the different wheatears and shrikes. I’ve even started to recognise one of those ‘little brown jobbies’ as a Sardinian Warbler. My finest moment in ornithology was when I was able to explain to Heather that the ‘peep’ ‘peep’ we could hear in the Barranco most summer evenings wasn’t a reversing JCB, but was in fact a scops owl.

We did have a couple of ‘twitchers’ staying with us recently. Mike and Hazel from Anglesey, who are also mad keen ‘rock and roll’ fans. This is their web site.   http://angleseyrocknrollclub.synthasite.com/

Mike took all kinds of photos of the Barranco bird life which I thought some of you may like to see. So here they are. I have deliberately not labelled them, in case any of you wanted to practice your recognition skills.

Any one know anything about this 'zebra' ant

Anyone know what insect this nest is used by?

A Parranda with Katty

I was waiting for the afternoon to cool down enough to take the dogs for a walk up the mountain, when Katty came by the casa. As usual she wanted to know what I was doing? Where was Heather?  Was she well? When would she be back? Was she still going to Spanish Classes? “Muy bien”! - though she agreed with me, that even if I didn’t sell much, setting up a stall in the local market and dealing with the locals, was a better way to learn the language,

We chatted about the local election. 83% of the voters in Oria had turned out, with the result that the sitting Mayor had been defeated by a margin of just 20 votes( 750 to 730). A very close result, but now it is all change in the town hall. Katty wasn’t at all happy, partly because her man didn’t win, but mainly because the eagerly anticipated works at the fuenta, started but nowhere near completed, by the last Mayor, had all been abruptly stopped since the result.

Just then Andre came up the camino in his ancient red Renault 4, loaded inside and out with the hay, that he had recently cut from several of his tiny fields that are dotted around the valley sides.  What a workhorse that old Reanault 4 is – it’s his taxi and his ‘burro’, used to ferry his grandkids Jonny and Lucie  to school; Isobel to the market and himself down to his weekly card game; as well as all kinds of other tasks on his scattered smallholding in the barranco.

His goats don’t just forage on the mountain herbs. At various times of year their diet is supplemented by other foods. Olive stems after the January harvest; cobs of corn in late summer; almond husks in September, and now the spring hay. 

The usual cheery “Hola”, came from the open window as he passed.

Katty and I continued our chat – how unusually wet the spring had been, but how it had made everywhere green and how especially beautiful the flowers that lined the lanes were. She chided me for spoiling my dogs – “they have too much food and attention”; and wanted to know if we were expecting more visitors this summer?

She was about to move on when Heather returned from her Sevilliana dancing class that she enjoys twice weekly with a group of other women and children, Spanish and British, in the next village of Los Cerricos. 

Katty went of to greet her, with a hug and kisses on both cheeks. "What dance have you been learning today", she asked?  ‘The Parranda’, Heather replied, which resulted in a spontaneous dance  in the camino  with Katty playing imaginary castanets and loudly humming a happy folk tune she had learned as girl.

In Spanish 'parranda' means to go to a Party - these two just had a party on the street.