As I head off for my Boxing Day walk – a tradition for many people in the UK – I will be keeping this great little blog post by Dawood Qureshi in mind. I am spending my Christmas period with my family in north Essex – a completely different landscape to the hills of the Cotswolds that have been my home since September and the varied landscape of the hills, levels, woodlands and riverscape of the Bristol area where I also spend much of my time. Winter is perhaps my favourite time of year at Hamford Water, which our farm borders on to. Flocks of Dark Bellied Brent Geese join hundreds of other waders and waterfowl. This is an area where the summer brings hundreds of tourists but I often wonder why the winter doesn’t attract nearly as many for the wildlife spectacles we are rewarded with. I hope that you have had a wonderful Christmas and I wish you the very best for the new year.
Walking in short strides through the dense throng of bare, shivering trees. The whispery crunch of crystal coated leaves underfoot, my heavy boots pressing into the frosty, leaf littered ground and leaving a trail of shallow imprints in the cold, tough soil.Clenched hands pushed into the depths of my pockets, my rough fingers stretching to seek the warmth – I slowly raise my head to a cloudless sky, breath leaving my body in clouds of warm steam as I trudge through the birth of what could be a winter wildlife wonderland.
And I have yet again managed to execute an over exaggerated, highly dramatised entry into yet another article. But apart from that it is just as I have described- a winter wildlife wonderland is teetering on the edge of the great cliff of time (that basically means it might snow…) but most of the people I speak to when…
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