Free as a bird

It’s a beautiful weekend. Lockdown restrictions have been eased, we can see most of the Secret Seven in our back gardens (don’t tell George!) and it’s all fine (unless you are clinically vulnerable then it’s up to you to avoid the virus, which is fine because you know what it looks like).

Except, it’s not yet. The restrictions lift on Monday.

Let that sink in for a moment.

Monday.

This weekend, if you meet two friends in the park or have people who are not in your household in your garden you could be fined £100 even though they will be perfectly reasonable activities on Monday.

My garden has been bird party central. I’ve had to explain the rules to the dog. We’ve been very clear. He can chase pigeons out but only when they are not at the bird feeder. He must chase pigeons that are sitting on the blue tit box. He can chase a pigeon if it pecks the head of a baby starling but he can’t chase the starlings that shout and peck at each other’s heads all the time. To make it even clearer for him I’ve named most of the birds.
“Look, Fred is on the blue tit box!” I shout.
He looks, checking to see if Fred is a pigeon.
“Now, now, Billy, be nice, don’t peck Bobby on the head. You know better than that,” I say.
The dog’s ears prick up. He looks for pigeon that should know better, he rises on his haunches ready to spring and starts a low growl at the back of his throat.
“Leave it!” I tell him.
He flops back down under the sun lounger, exhausted by all the mixed messages.

Free as a bird seems a strange term. I suppose when you see them swooping in the sky, that’s how they look but I’ve been watching the blue tits since the beginning of lockdown and free is not a word I would associate with their current existence.

It took Sid a little while to find a mate. He had a thing for the bird in the mirror but no matter how much he tried to woo it the stupid thing refused to come out. When he found Sheila he brought her to see the mirror bird. They were both enchanted and would have considered a modern threesome but mirror bird refused to budge. Sid had made a very nice nest in the box and so Sheila forgave him his obsession and moved in. Sid worked harder than any little tit, collecting food to feed his love. He still refused to eat all the woolly bugs from the apple tree but thanked me for the meal worms and fat balls. A few weeks ago both Sid and Sheila took it in turns to leave the box. The chicks must have hatched. They were even more grateful for the suet block.

 Now, the chicks are almost ready to fledge. They’ve moved onto sunflower hearts. They poke their heads out, looking at the freedom that it promised them, waiting until they can go to the feeder themselves.

“On Monday,” Shiela tells them. “You can look but you mustn’t go yet. It isn’t safe. There are unseen dangers out there but don’t worry they’ll be gone by Monday.”