View From The Shed by Shaun Finnie - GREEN FOR GO

GREEN FOR GO

The more observant visitor to RSPB Old Moor will have noticed that I’ve been absent from my usual post at the Welcome Shed for the last few months. I’d love to say that I’ve been on a round-the-world cruise, searching for exotic new birds to add to my life list in far-flung, sunkissed locations. I’d love to, but I can’t. The sad truth is that I’ve been on carer duties, looking after my wife. She was seriously unwell for a while  but I’m pleased to report that she’s much better now and no longer needs me hovering over her and asking if she’s OK every ten minutes. Not that she ever really did - the wonderful staff at Barnsley General Hospital looked after her better than I could ever do - but it made me feel like I was doing something constructive. Man-care at its finest.

As part of her recuperation she’s been taking long walks in natural environments. Woods, hills, lakeside paths, you know the sort of things. Fortunately these are the kind of places that we birdwatchers gravitate to naturally. Birdsong, clean air, solitude, gentle exercise. All of these things are good for our mental and physical health and, experienced together, their sum is greater than their parts.

The NHS apparently agrees, even going so far to introduce an incentive named Green Social Prescribing. As they say, “There is strong and growing evidence that nature-based social prescribing plays an important role in improving mental and physical health”. You can read more about the NHS’s views on the subject here but the basic idea is that if we spend more time outside then it generally makes us happier. And happy people are generally healthier people. It sounds fluffy, I know, but the numbers back it up. It’s preventative medicine but it’s also a way to help people recuperate after any kind of medical problem. 

I’m no medical expert but even I can see that our regular nature walks have helped my wife’s wellbeing no end. Going to her happy place in a natural surrounding has helped with her physical healing too. As you’d expect, a large portion of her recovery has involved walking around Old Moor. It’s been a delight reacquainting ourselves with the natural world here and seeing it through new eyes; those of someone almost forced to calm down, to appreciate the smaller, simpler and more natural things in life. Being outside and interacting with the natural world induces feelings of wellbeing. Put simply, it cheers us up, and good mental health directly leads to good physical health. 

Could it be that these good feelings just take our minds off the pain and illness, therefore giving us the impression of wellness? Quite possibly, yes, but does it matter? If we feel better, we feel better, regardless of the reason.

As she puts it, “The Robin who happily eats mealworms from my hand doesn’t care how healthy I am or how ill I’ve been. He just sees me as a food provider. The fact that I get great pleasure from him landing on my fingers means nothing to the Robin, but his trust and closeness lifts my mood immensely. I am, for that moment at least, not defined by my illness.”

Bless. I’m filling up.

And of course the physical act of a decent walk has well-documented natural benefits. If we get some birdwatcher happiness as well, then all the better. This happened to me this week when I went to see the Long-Tailed Duck that has taken up residence at Pugney’s Country Park in Wakefield, just a short drive from my home. 

This little sea duck was about as far away from the coast as it’s possible to get in Britain, having been blown into deepest Yorkshire by one of the big named storms we’ve had recently. My wife called it a ‘dirty duck’ and she wasn’t wrong.  Look in the guidebooks and you’ll see that the Long-Tail is an elegant black, white and grey little duck with a delicate pink blush on its beak. Its most striking features though, and the ones that gives the bird its name, are the elongated tail feathers that stretch out almost as long as its total body length. They truly are magnificent… apparently. The one we saw looked nothing like that. Jill was right; it was simply a dirty duck. Its clean white flanks and face were smudged with brown blobs and if I’m honest (and I invariably am) none of us who were gathered to see it could be certain if it was a he-duck or a she-duck. Distance, flat winter light, ducky eclipse season and rubbish birders can be blamed in varying portions. 

But you know what? We didn’t care. The duck knows what it is. Even if it’s a long way from any potential mates, it was feeding like it wanted to empty the lake. It seemed happy enough and we certainly were. We had fresh air in our lungs, a little stiffness in our leg muscles and big smiles on our faces as we finally located the no-tailed long-tail. That’s good medicine. The best walks can provide that.

Of course, our frequent trips out would have been much more pleasant if we’d had cold, crisp winter mornings that we expected and hoped for at this time of year, the kind of days that are depicted on thousands of Christmas cards and the ‘January’ page of many calendars. Instead we’ve been left soggy by a constant round of storm after storm, and it’s this Great Deluge of ‘24 that I’ll be talking about next week. See you then.