Linger a little

A family of Great Spotted Woodpeckers by Guy Taplin

This morning it’s warm again, so I decide that Moss’s morning walk will be in the woods, where it’s a lot cooler. 

We’ve been walking on a similar route, around the woods, and I’ve noticed a bird call, which I don't recognise at all - it sounds more frantic and demanding than joyful.

On my mobile phone, I have an app called Merlin, it’s for bird song identification.  You simply hold it up and it identifies the birds that are calling within its range.  

It astonishes me.

Merlin keeps telling me that there’s a Great Spotted Woodpecker close by, but I can’t see one anywhere.

I think to myself, I’ll just linger a little and see what happens.

Moss is pootling about in the undergrowth having a great time, she’s not remotely interested in my bird watching exploits.

I stand, wait and listen.

Then by clambering about a bit I’m able to get closer to the source of the sound.  It’s loud.  I realise that it’s coming from somewhere in a coppiced chestnut tree.

I’m still unclear, so the next day I go back to the same spot.

I find the tree again and I still hear that frantic call.

Eventually I glimpse a Great Spotted Woodpecker, distinctive in its black and white plumage with flashes of red.

Finally, I put two and two together …

About five metres up in the chestnut tree I see a small circular hole.

 I’ve discovered a nest of Great Spotted Woodpeckers!

And the desperate sound I can hear must be the call of the young woodpeckers inside the nest calling for their parents.

By now Moss had become quite used to my habit of standing by a tree with my neck crooked at an awkward angle.

I notice that when the parent birds are close by their nest, the tone of the young bird’s call inside the nest becomes more frantic. 

Eventually, after a lot of waiting, I see both parent birds fly to the tree and creep round to their nest to feed their young.   

As I watch them I can barely breath. 

I see the parent birds grip onto the edge of the nest and poke their heads in - classic woodpecker style.

Around the trunk of the tree, where the nest is, I can see scars on the bark of the tree where the parent birds have held onto the tree with their claws. 

They are the scars of parental labour, I think to myself. 

All too soon the young birds will fly the nest and this experience will be just a memory.  In the meantime, Moss and I will go back to the tree each day, to see if I can spot them.

AJK

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