Thirty years ago I started working for the RSPB on a six month upland bird surveying contract – with the additional challenge of helping to protect England’s only regular nesting hen harriers. The Forest of Bowland was the only stronghold for hen harriers in England in 1982 – it still is. I’ll be contributing a series of guest blogs over the spring and summer and tweeting in real time on @andrefarrar
Suddenly a very familiar sound was part of the upland chorus. The cuckoos had arrived. Trouble ahead for the ubiquitous meadow pipits that had been displaying for weeks.
Cuckoos were arriving in the hills. Photo John Bridges, RSPB Images
One was calling from a clough while I was watching a skirmish between two merlins confirming a suspicion that I’d been watching two pairs. Clough, by the way, is pronounced ‘cloo’ in Lancashire, not ‘cluff’ I’d made that mistake early on!
The peregrines could only be a few days from hatching – I was feeling more anxious than the pair appeared to be, on this visit the female was sitting on the nest and the male on his regular sentinel heather clump overlooking the nesting valley. He’d long ago stopped bothering to check me out as I scanned the nest from a vantage point opposite his.
My focus on the heather-dominated parts of the hills (the bits the harriers preferred) meant that I’d spent less time visiting areas that were more grass-dominated. Here the plaintive calls of golden plovers were an introduction to another bird that I’d only known previously in its winter flocks.
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