Eden Street Squirrel returns

Exactly a year to the day since first seen, the Grey Squirrel returned early this morning to finish the job started last year.
(see Eden Street Squirrel).

Strawberry Fair Parade 2009

The Parade begins on Christ’s Pieces…

Fair drinking

Title tells a different story.

Cambridge Beer Festival 2009 – Green Beer

Cambridge Beer Festival 2009

36th Cambridge Beer Festival

This is Stonehenge Ales Sign Of Spring, an award winning seasonal beer from Wiltshire.

I hadn’t intended trying it until I saw someone handed a glass as I waited for another beer. I’ve blamed many a hangover on green beer, but this is the first I’ve knowingly bought.

It doesn’t taste quite as green as it looks (Nethergate’s coriander Umbel Ale should look like this!) but is a smooth, pleasant enough bitter that raised a smile.

Blackbird fledgling

RSPB Blackbird Breeding says Blackbirds usually fledge after 13-14 days and can then take a week to learn how to fly.

In my experience, for 2-3 weeks after fledging they are almost entirely dependent on their parents for food and still in the early stages of mastering flight.

14th April – The first fledglings of the year, 2 Blackbirds in the yard,

Eden Street Blackcap

Yesterday I happened to see a Blackcap in the backyard. I can’t recall ever seeing an overwintering Blackcap before, only seeing them during summer, and more unusually, it was hanging on the peanut feeder (it eats insects and berries). Typically, as I fumbled with a camera, it flew and hasn’t returned.

According to the BTO, there has recently been a rapid increase in the numbers of Blackcaps wintering in Britain, deciding not to travel south across the Sahara Desert. With luck, it might reappear for the Big Garden Birdwatch this weekend.

Blackcap illustration by Mike Langman (RSPB)

Remembrance Sunday – Parkers Piece

…the beginning of the 2 minutes silence…

Eden Street Sparrow Hawk

20th September 2008
A sparrowhawk came crashing into the back yard today, obviously in pursuit of prey, landing ungracefully on the roof of our car, before moving to the wall and eventually up into the cover of the small trees. It rested for a few minutes and I managed to grab a camera and take a few shots of it peering out from behind the clothesline before it flew out of sight along the back yards of Eden Street Backway.

Postbox – Priory Road / Riverside

This postbox is said to have once stood outside the gates to one of Cambridge’s colleges. As the college gates used to be locked shut each evening, the postbox was used by students to climb over the locked gate at night. This spiky top was added as a deterrent!

I don’t know which college it used to stand near; it has apparently been moved several times. It now stands on the corner of Priory Road and Riverside where it mostly deters pigeons from landing.

Parker’s Piece – Reality Checkpoint

Reality Checkpoint is in the middle of Parker’s Piece, Cambridge.
It is carved on a lamppost, probably the first electrical one in Cambridge, dating from 1894. The carving first appeared in the 60s or 70s and has been carved again when necessary ever since.