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A trunk call

14 January 2016 by Simon Barnes 20 Comments

There’s a big ash tree at the bottom of the garden, in full view from the bedroom window. When you stare out in winter before the day’s thought-processes have started to kick in, it’s possible to discern in the bare branches the bearded features of both DH Lawrence and Charles Darwin.

It’s a funky old tree and touch wood – note good choice of words here —  no sign of chalara. Its big, wide elephant-coloured trunk  — another good word, I’m on fire today – is about ten yards from the window of my writing-hut, so it’s a good target for blank stares between paragraphs.

When we first moved in I heard a treecreeper’s high, thin call trickling down from high in the ash tree’s thin branches, and I put it on the house list. I felt – not exactly guilty about it, but as the first certainties got a little eroded by time, I wondered just a little. Then last summer in the same tree, Eddie and I saw a treecreeper scurrying up the trunk in the merry mousey way that is part of the treecreeper’s inheritance. So that’s all right then.

A day or so ago, in the final frenzies of the book I’m writing, I gave my eyes and brain a break and turned to that gloriously inviting window. Naturally I looked first to the vaster expanses of the marsh, but I picked up a flicker of movement from the tail of my left eye, and there was the ash and there once again was its bird.

There is a special sort of delight that’s reserved for the not-uncommon but seldom-seen. As if the man on the door had ushered you through, aware that you had been issued with an access-all-areas pass into the wild world. The stuff that normally goes on in secret is briefly open to you.

That flickering, jerky progress up the trunk, the parachute descent to the bottom so that it can make this climbing, skittering feeding-run all over again, the startling white of the belly, the busy probing of that sharp curved tool of a beak… its sudden vanishing was a call to duty. I turned back to the screen and my book.

Call it research. The book is to be called The Meaning of Birds. There’s a meeting in my hut tomorrow to discuss illustrations. I hope the treecreeper will attend but if he’s busy, I’ll understand.

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Posted in Wildblog

Comments

  1. Bob Reeves says

    14 January 2016 at 7:53 pm

    A really lovely blog, Simon. We can all relate to it.
    e are off to S Africa on saturday, to the Kruger Park, and would love to see lots of things creeping, big and small.

    Reply
    • Simon Barnes says

      21 January 2016 at 5:23 pm

      Have a great trip Bob, look forward to hearing about it when you get back.

      Reply
  2. Liz Reeves says

    14 January 2016 at 7:58 pm

    So please include the sparrowhawk. Not liked by many as they take the little birds but I argue that just one or two keep this beauty alive. I was chatting to my neighbour today when over her shoulder I spotted those amber staring eyes from the corner of my own. A flash of recognition and it was gone.

    Reply
    • Simon Barnes says

      21 January 2016 at 5:24 pm

      Nothing like a sparrowhawk, Anthony Powell talks about quotes ‘instantaneous dramas played to an audience of one.’ That’s a sparrowhawk.

      Reply
  3. David Valentine says

    14 January 2016 at 8:46 pm

    Lovely description as always! Good luck with the book

    Reply
    • Simon Barnes says

      21 January 2016 at 5:25 pm

      Thanks David.

      Reply
  4. David Dunlop says

    15 January 2016 at 10:02 am

    Good words aplenty; and in a good order, as ever.

    Treecreepers always remind me of “home”; I think because I’d never seen a Nuthatch until I moved from (Northern) Ireland nearly thirty years ago, where the latter doesn’t occur. Such a colourful and less furtive bird of treetrunks rather draws the eye and, somehow, I remember Treecreepers being more prominent in County Antrim, but perhaps just for absence of a showy rival.

    All best wishes for the new book.

    Reply
    • Simon Barnes says

      21 January 2016 at 5:26 pm

      The thing about nuthatches, is unlike most birds, they have their beak at the bottom and the feet at the top.

      Reply
  5. Christine Wickham says

    15 January 2016 at 7:13 pm

    Just what I needed after a busy day – you transported me to another place, perfectly visible, completely tranquil. Thanks!

    Reply
    • Simon Barnes says

      21 January 2016 at 5:26 pm

      Delighted you enjoyed it.

      Reply
  6. Anne says

    15 January 2016 at 8:52 pm

    Beautifully descriptive, I have those wonderful images now too! Thanks Simon

    Reply
    • Simon Barnes says

      21 January 2016 at 5:26 pm

      Many thanks for kind words.

      Reply
  7. Anthony Bird says

    16 January 2016 at 3:31 pm

    Ah, you lucky,lucky man, although I know that deep down it is not luck but damned hard work to get to the position you are in, keep ’em coming!!

    Reply
    • Simon Barnes says

      21 January 2016 at 5:27 pm

      Never discount the luck factor in any human enterprise.

      Reply
  8. Greg Heaton says

    16 January 2016 at 7:18 pm

    As tweeted…Best writer on the planet. Check out the sporting backbook#inspiring.

    Reply
    • Simon Barnes says

      21 January 2016 at 5:28 pm

      Thanks a million Greg.

      Reply
  9. Helen Buckland says

    17 January 2016 at 9:25 pm

    I am so pleased to be able to read your blog… I have missed your Saturday column in the Times since you stopped. We have a 100 year old sycamore at the end of the garden that now has a tree preservation order on it, and it also has the face of a tree spirit that can be seen in winter, before the leaves reappear.

    Reply
    • Simon Barnes says

      21 January 2016 at 5:29 pm

      Trees are so much more rewarding than inkblots don’t you think?

      Reply
  10. Olly says

    17 January 2016 at 10:23 pm

    ‘There is a special sort of delight that’s reserved for the not-uncommon but seldom-seen.’ I couldn’t agree more. I was walking in some woodland yesterday and heard the needle – like call of Goldcrests nearby. Then I saw one, no more than 4 feet away; impossibly tiny, constantly on the move, a little ball of energy. A bird I hear all the time, but rarely see other than catching a fleeting glance high up in a tree. Glorious.

    Reply
    • Simon Barnes says

      21 January 2016 at 5:30 pm

      Wonderful, they really are special little birds.

      Reply

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