First Wheatear

 
 
I can feel the earth, swollen with spring, ready to burst forth but those biting Easterlies are holding it back. The sunshine during the middle of the day barely gets a chance to warm the earth before the cold sets in again in the late afternoon. Here and there a Celandine timidly tests the air, though it's leaves remain dusted with frost and even a Red campion has had the audacity to sprout a couple of blossoms. The Gorse is blooming but without any warmth only gives up it's coconut scent at the risk of injured nostrils.
I was very surprised then to see a Wheatear appear in the Llama fields, in the company of thrushes, on Wednesday morning.
It was perched on top of the only rock in the field but was quickly on it's way with that strong swerving flight they have as if they're thinking "well I'm off but I'm not sure which way I'm going yet".
The Llama fields belong to Venton Vision farm and are roughly square unimproved pasture of about half an acre each. They are surrounded by ancient crumbling walls out of which grows gnarled old Blackthorn and wind sculpted Elder. Llamas don't seem to have a taste for Blackthorn shoots as they are sprouting up from the grass around the field margins and remain untouched. The fields slope gently up and away from the lane and in the top corner of the first field a forgotten, rotting touring caravan decomposes, it's thin aluminium hide, ripped off by the gales, exposing a feeble skeleton of thin wooden battens.
The strong Easterly winds, along with the sunshine, is just right for drying out the wet ground but it has flattened out the Atlantic swell and now creates fussy litle breakers that impotently fall upon the shore. Though just listening to them you could be forgiven for thinking they were a lot bigger.