This Birding Life (37 page)

This year, I saw my first Swift on 21 April, a week or so earlier than usual. As always, it was a moment that defines the coming of summer and makes me realise that the natural world is still functioning as it should. Others, including former Poet Laureate Ted Hughes, have shared this view. He once penned these lines on the birds' miraculous annual return:

They've made it again,
Which means the globe's still working, the
Creation's
Still refreshed, our summer's
Still all to come …

But what is it about Swifts that inspires us so? Well for a start, their ability to fly here non-stop from Africa, homing in on the urban skyscape that will be their summer home. Then, once they get here, their extraordinary morning and evening display flights, as dozens of them chase each other across the sky like racing drivers entering a chicane, screaming as they go. It was this extraordinary sound that earned them the folk name ‘devil bird', along with dozens of other related epithets including ‘devil screamer', ‘swing devil' and even ‘devil's bitch'.

Yet despite their association with Satan, most people regard Swifts with affection and admiration rather than fear. This may be because if you live in the centre of a city, the Swifts' arrival is often the first indication that the long dark days of winter are finally over, and summer has finally begun.

I also like to think that we recognise athletic prowess when we see it. For as their name suggests, Swifts are the ultimate flying machines: capable of staying airborne for months on end, sustaining themselves by grabbing small insects in their huge gapes as they fly.

They even sleep on the wing. Watch as dusk falls on a fine summer's evening, and you will see the Swifts rise higher and higher into the heavens, eventually disappearing from view. It is here, high in the sky, where they choose to rest: though catnapping might be a better description.

For such an aerial bird, landing is the exception rather than the rule. Indeed the only time Swifts perch at all is when they visit their nest, usually under the eaves of a tall building. One of the most famous colonies is in Oxford, where they breed, appropriately enough, in the tower of the university's Museum of Natural History. Half a century ago, the great Oxford ornithologist David Lack wrote about this colony in his book
Swifts in a Tower
, still one of the best popular scientific accounts of a British breeding bird.

But as Lack noted, if a Swift lands on the ground, it is in big trouble. Aerodynamically designed for flight, with huge wings and tiny legs (its generic name
Apus
actually means ‘no feet'), once the bird is accidentally grounded it finds it almost impossible to get airborne again.

I remember getting a phone call many years ago from a friend's mother, who had discovered a Swift on her back lawn after a heavy thunderstorm. When I arrived the bird was a shivering mass of dark feathers and looked close to death. But we picked it up and dried it off, then as the rain cleared, took it outside to be released. I can still remember the feeling of joy as I watched it take off from my outstretched palm and fly off into the grey skies, back where it belonged.

Gardeners have always known about the therapeutic value of their hobby; now, it seems, they can be even more pleased with themselves.
For they are not only healthier and happier than their counterparts without green fingers, they actually live longer as well.

The fact that close encounters with plants makes for a well-balanced way of life comes as no surprise to me. The same is true, after all, of anyone with a passion for nature. Over the years I have come to know a very varied bunch of wildlife enthusiasts, and although they come from a wide range of backgrounds, they have one thing in common: a zest for life. It is easy to assume that this comes from being out and about in the fresh air, maintaining their physical fitness, but there is much more to it than that. In my view, the mental, emotional and spiritual sides of wildlife watching are at least as important as any physical benefit.

Talk to anyone who has gone through a major life-changing event – redundancy, divorce or bereavement, for example – and ask them how they came to terms with the change in their lives. Of course, family and friends are the first people you turn to, but if you have a passion for watching wildlife you have another vital means of support.

At its most basic, nature offers you a way to escape. In times of crisis, being able to get away from it all is a great help, and you are probably better taking a country walk than drowning your sorrows in the local pub. Then there is the sense of perspective you get from wildlife. Watching a wild animal go about its daily business really does put human affairs into context. It helps you realise that whatever is happening to you, the world is still turning and other living things are carrying on with their daily lives.

If you have a local patch – a place where you regularly go to watch and enjoy wildlife – then you are in touch with the passing of the seasons, and the comings and goings of birds and other creatures. In a world where it is all too easy to get things out of context, this is by far the best way to re-engage with reality.

Seven years ago this spring my mother died, and soon afterwards my marriage broke up. From being confident, happy and successful I
was plunged into a mood of doubt and despair. Fortunately I had the support of my friends and family, and the love of my life, Suzanne. But I also had a place to think, to reflect on life and to escape.

Now, I can look back on that difficult time with something approaching equanimity. And I can take my young son Charlie around my local patch and point out the birds – though being just seven months old he has not quite learnt how to use binoculars yet. As we watch fox cubs gambolling on the grassy bank, listen to the chorus of marsh frogs and enjoy the antics of nesting Lapwings, I can affirm that being close to nature really does make you feel better.

One hundred years ago, on I January 1905, a young man living on the borders of Kent and Sussex decided to keep a list of the number of different birds he saw on New Year's Day. Horace Alexander only managed 17 species, so the following year he enlisted his brother Christopher in the quest. This time they were more successful, tallying a grand total of 33.

Looking back almost seven decades in his autobiography
Seventy Years of Birdwatching
, Horace Alexander recalled how relaxed he and his brother had been. They did not even leave the house until after breakfast, returned home for lunch and travelled everywhere on foot.

But a tradition had begun, and despite excuses, hangovers and the call of the January sales, thousands of birders will keep it going on 1 January 2005. Why we do so is hard to explain: but there is something about the freshness of the New Year that brings hope to the heart of even the most jaded birder.

In North America, this obsession with listing finds its outlet over the whole of the festive season. The Christmas Bird Count began in
1900, when a young ornithologist named Frank Chapman persuaded about two dozen people to go out and log not just the species they saw, but the number of individual birds as well. Nowadays the Christmas Bird Count is a national tradition: with 2000 different events involving about 50,000 participants, from Alaska to Hawaii and California to Florida. Counters use every possible method to log birds, including dog-teams, canoes, hang-gliders, hovercraft and even golf-carts!

At the BBC Natural History Unit, we indulge in a rather more leisurely contest, organised by my colleague Martin Hughes-Games. With a silver cup at stake, the birders among us count the total number of species we see during eight days, from midnight on Christmas Eve to the end of New Year's Day. In the past, some contestants have considered sending themselves on a filming trip to some exotic location in order to snatch the prize, but this was thought to be contrary to the spirit of the contest, and all participants must now remain within the borders of the UK.

Attitudes to the contest vary between the laid-back and the fanatical. Some people hire cottages on the north Norfolk coast to be as near to the birds as possible, while others have the advantage of living near Chew Valley Lake, with its wintering Bitterns. If you want to win, an early start is essential: last year one participant heard both Tawny and Little Owls during the first half an hour after midnight – despite, as he put it, being ‘very, very drunk'.

True to the amateur ethos of the contest, I shall take a couple of walks around my local patch, gaze out of the back window and tick off Ring-necked Parakeet – safe in the knowledge that this exotic creature has not yet reached Bristol, where most of my colleagues live. Horace and Christopher Alexander would, I am sure, have approved.