Once I had taken the lid off the box he flew straight and true across the garden and up into a tall silver birch tree. I pondered letting him get on with it, but the temptation to say a proper farewell and give him some Sound Survival Advice proved too much (well, I am the closest thing he's got to a mother after all). So I walked over to the tree where he was sitting and watched him for a while.
He stared down at me in that slow, imperious, unblinking way Tawny Owls have. It's a regard that makes you feel you ought to curtsey after swiftly dropping your gaze. Staring contests between people and owls are, I should imagine, generally won hands down by owls. After a while a bird made a noise nearby and he turned to stare at that instead, then he began to look all around him, head swiveling at every new sound.
It must have been a little overwhelming to an owl who has essentially been raised by humans, but he seemed to know what he was doing when he made for and landed in the tree, and although I felt a pang that this was almost certainly the last time I would see him, the larger emotion was one of joy that he had made it this far, that he was, at long last, back in the wild where he belonged.
As I walked back to the house through the gathering gloaming, a female Tawny began calling softly from a tree on the other side of the lake. I whispered a prayer to the breeze and the night air that Bop would be OK and that the other wols who live here would be kind to him and show him The Way Of Owls.
To everyone who has wished him well, sent him a prayer, asked the Nature Gods to keep an eye out for him over the last eight weeks, spared him a thought now and then: thank you :o)
I met up with the Butterfly Whisperer for a spot of Chalk Indulgence today. We haven't been flutter spotting together for a couple of weeks and it was nice to revisit old haunts.
The second generations of Adonis Blue and Brown Argus are due out about now, and I had yet to see any Chalkhill Blues or Silver Spotted Skippers this summer. With the exception of the Adonis (perhaps a wee bit early yet for them) we ticked all the others off our list and I got my first ever pic of a Silver Spotted Skipper, so I was chuffed :o) In fact, we saw loads of them. Today's three new species take my year's butterfly total to 39, beating last year's of 36 and there are still three more that I should be able to see (Clouded Yellow, Adonis and hopefully Brown Hairstreak) before the Butterfly Year ends. I also saw a plant that has the best name of all plants: Squinancywort :o)
![]() |
Female Brown Argus |
![]() |
Female Brown Argus |
![]() |
Chalkhill Blue |
![]() |
Chalkhill Blue |
![]() |
Chalkhill Blue |
![]() |
Chalkhill Blue |
![]() |
Dark Green Fritillary |
![]() |
Dark Green Frit |
![]() |
Dark Green Frit |
![]() |
Dodder (a parasitic plant that likes ant hills) |
![]() |
The King Tree on the old drovers road that runs across the Down |
![]() |
Mariscolore (female Common Blue colour variation). |
![]() |
Silver Spotted Skipper! |
![]() |
Another Silver Spotted Skipper |
![]() |
Two Silver Spotted Skippers! Aren't they pretty little things? |
![]() |
The wonderfully named Squinancywort :o) |
![]() |
Autumn berries on the Wayfaring Tree |
I'll leave you with a last pic of the Beautiful Tawny owl I have had the absolute pleasure of knowing this summer, and wish you all a peaceful evening.
CT x