The last of the rusted red leaves drift to the frosted ground. Fieldfares take up residence in berry trees; devouring their scarlet fruits. Heads and tails the same deep steely blue as the sky above. They adorn black speckled waistcoats that neatly meet its preened pale yellow breast. Their bubbling calls tumble over the landscape, making their presence known. A flock of Starlings race over the fields their black shapes moving intertwined; like a floating drop of water caught in a hurricane they simultaneously twist and dive. They land in the bare top of an aged oak making its branches rattle and sway. Their bodies glimmering like twinkling iridescent stars, stippled onto their velvety black bodies bobbing and fluttering in the canopy above. In a fleeting instant they once again launch into the piercing air, surrounding me with a rush of beating wings enveloping me into their coherent group folding themselves around me. In this spontaneous rush (this swift second) I feel the closest to nature.
Witnessing the wonder of winter
Josh Hill, a young Shropshire, birder and keen photographer, writes about winter birds.