Wild Hares and Hummingbirds Read Online Free Page B

and walk across a muddy field; deeply rutted with tractor tracks, and dotted with patches of standing water. A familiar sound – perhaps the sound of the countryside – comes from somewhere ahead of me, but with the sun shining straight into my eyes I cannot see the bird that is making it. I skirt around to get a better view, past a clump of molehills, and realise, to my surprise, that there are more than a hundred birds feeding here. Most are redwings, with their usual companions, a dozen or so fieldfares; and a couple of meadow pipits.
    Then I see what I am looking for, a short way from the main flock: three sandy-coloured birds, their paleness standing out against the dark, loamy soil. They are skylarks, the iconic British farmland bird; yet here in the parish, hardly a common sight. This is partly because the ground is almost permanently soggy, unsuitable for arable crops. But it is also because like so many of our familiar countryside birds, the skylark has suffered a catastrophic decline, numbers falling by more than half in my own lifetime.
    When amateur birders all over Britain took part in the British Trust for Ornithology’s first Atlas survey, back in the late 1960s, the skylark was Britain’s most widespread bird. Today, both its population and range have contracted dramatically. Modern farming methods – industrial processes that have no place for, or concern with, nature – are largely responsible. But those of us who enjoy cheap food, and the convenience of supermarkets, must also bear our share of the blame. For if we cannot safeguard a bird as intrinsic to our landscape as the skylark, what hope is there for rest of the countryside and its wildlife?
    On sunny days in early spring, I do occasionally hear the song of the skylark, as it flies high in the skies above the parish fields. Straining my eyes to find this almost invisible dot, I marvel at its ability to sing constantly for hours on end. But my pleasure is tinged by sadness, as I think about the two million or more pairs of skylarks we have lost in the short time that I have been on this earth.

    B Y THE END of the month, the snow is but a distant memory, though patches of ice still persist in the shadier corners of the parish. On fine, sunny days the sky now glows blue with the distant promise of spring. Just above the Mendips, there is a long, thin layer of smoky cloud, as a lone hot-air balloon drifts upwards, and an easyJet plane descends slowly towards Bristol airport.
    Just like the snow, the mud along the droves reveals what has passed by: the paw-prints and horseshoes of the local hunt, whose hounds, horses and green-clad riders entertained the village children as they came past earlier in the day, in pursuit of a local fox.
    Until I came to Somerset, my experience of foxes was confined to those I saw in Bristol or London. There, if I came across a fox it would stand its ground, facing me defiantly until I gave in and walked away. How very different from Somerset foxes, which have developed the art of self-preservation not needed by their city cousins.
    When I wander down to the end of my garden and find a fox asleep in a sheltered, sunny corner, the sheer sense of panic as it wakes is extraordinary. Even during the heavy snow, when I watched a large dog fox padding purposefully across a field, I knew that when he caught sight of me he would head off in the opposite direction – which is exactly what he did.
    The thaw has revealed signs of another, even more elusive mammal, the mole, with masses of molehills appearing at the edges of grassy fields. I recall my grandmother telling me that her father – my great-grandfather – was the proud owner of a genuine moleskin waistcoat; which he presumably obtained from the local mole-catcher. But nobody bothers to trap moles any more – they either put up with the damage to their fields and lawns, or call in the pest controllers to poison them.
    As we wait for February to arrive, the lengthening