With the bird table being situated near the edge of Smithy Brook we are fortunate to have some water loving VIP’s to visit too and this makes for a varied and interesting list of diners popping in for a snack. The table and feeders have a constant stream of hungry beaks belonging to all the usual candidates waiting their turn to tuck into the meal of the day, but it is always a special pleasure when the ‘Brooksiders’ leave their watery haunts and choose to join us.
I have to say my favourite little characters are the Moorhens who appear several times daily to crash the avian banquet and eat up the over spill from the usual messy culprits. They enter the scene brookside, nervously looking around them like guilty thieves about to commit a crime and crumb snatch their way around the base of the table and feeders to snaffle up the leftovers. They stroll about like a feathered Bonny and Clyde, undercover, doing their best to remain unseen whilst not missing a single morsal. Sometimes they also make solitary raids and I love to watch them casing the joint with their beady eyes darting and their tails constantly flicking revealing the white feathers beneath as if flashing their underwear. They patrol for quite a while until they are satisfied that they have eaten all the rich pickings. Their title Common Moorhen really does not do them justice as they really are quite distinctive. Their black looking plumage makes the white flash across their bodies stand out and compliments their yellow legs with their yellow tipped, red bill and forehead shield completing their chic appearance.
Another brook loving character that most certainly deserves a grander prefix to its title than common is the Common Kingfisher and this does not do this remarkable creature justice. For there is nothing common about this colourful specimen in fact no other bird on the British riverbanks and streams can match it. Not that you would ever see a Kingfisher partaking of the communal feast the bird table provides far from it as he lives a much more private life, in fact I have never once caught a glimpse of a Kingfisher here at Smithy Brook. Others have seen that blue and orange flash and longer glimpses as he gazes intently into the brook from the bridge but not me and because I have never seen one ever this has troubled me greatly. You could say I was beginning to take it personally. Whenever I was out and about at home or away near all flowing water haunts, I would always keep a keen eye out for Mr Elusive King of Fishers, unsuccessfully, imagining him laughing at me from his fishy lair. Until recently, that is, when I arranged to meet my close friend, Carolyn and her lovely granddaughter Pippa for a socially distanced walk beside the River Holme at Holmfirth. With nothing else but chatting and catching up and a bit of fun and games with Pippa in mind I parked the car and met Carolyn as she arrived on foot with the pushchair. The first words she uttered were, “I’ve just seen a Kingfisher!” and how many times had I heard that? Grrrrr! We turned the corner and picked up the riverside path and began catching up on gossip but I was distracted and could not take my eyes of the river and just as I uttered, “Well I’m watching for a Kingfisher”. We both paused and watched the unmistakable orange and blue undulating fly past as if we had just summoned it up by magic and that performance was especially for us.
Such a special moment with a special friend but the magic did not end there. A few days later I received a Christmas card from Carolyn in the post and she had written, Here’s to more Kingfishers in 2021, which made me smile. The following day I was out walking with Chris with his new camera and whilst he was taking some shots by some fishing lakes I wandered on ahead but was stopped in my tracks when there only a couple of metres away from where I was standing sitting on a branch over the water was the perfectly posed Kingfisher I froze and soaked in the majestic sight just for a few seconds before he was off but long enough to appreciate the perfect sighting. So, I have come to the conclusion that Carolyn is some kind of Kingfisher whisperer and as soon as Covid restrictions allow she is coming down to Smithy Brook to work her magic on our shy little fellow. They say you wait ages for a bus then many arrive all at once so come in number three your time is up.
