Birding Braunie

This is my first blog since the middle of April. This is mainly due to my working life being turned upside down. It is very difficult to get motivated to write the events of a day when your mind needs to focus on other priorities. But slowly things are improving and life as a freelancer does have a few advantages. An example of this my lunchtimes now consist of a walk around a small pocket of Epping Forest photographing butterflies and dragonflies. In the past it would have been a stressed dash to an overpriced sandwich shop along with a million others and straight back to my desk. (I will save the advantages of not commenting for another day as that’s a blog on its own!) So now I have that out of the way, let’s get on with the business as usual. When you volunteer for the Lee Valley Park, what that really means is you are actually volunteering to experience many amazing things and events. From a ticket to the Bird Fair to organised trips around bird reserves such as Frampton Marsh...

This little sortie into Suffolk...or is it Norfolk...or is it both? I get dizzy travelling that road from the M11 to Brandon, just  a stone-curlew’s throw from Thetford Forest. The signs say welcome to Suffolk, then Cambridgeshire then Suffolk again or Norfolk or somewhere then the screeching of tyres and your passengers fly across the car interior as you nearly miss the entrance to Weeting Heath. Attention! Myself and my accomplice on this particular mission, Brenda, are greeted by a gentleman who reminds me of the bull elephant in the Jungle Book. The khaki shorts, handlebar moustache and general air of a time not out of place in the time of the Raj. I’m being unfair as the 'major' is a calm and caring man who has always been stationed at Weeting since I can ever remember. He talks about a time when he lived in central Africa and I can see it. I could listen to his banter all day but we had come to see the Stone-curlews and hopefully the regular Spotted Flycatcher that fr...