Bye Bye Birdy

Mr Flum returned from his walk in great excitement, having noticed an unusual bird lying dead in a bus shelter next to the fields.

From his photo I took it to be some kind of bunting, but, when we went to look at it, I saw it was far too big; as we discovered and, as many blippers will know, it is a Red-legged Partridge.

Although we are no experts, this is not the sort of bird we see on the Southern suburbs of Edinburgh, which raises the question: is this an unusual sighting or have we merely not noticed them before?

Either way, it is very sad to see such a beautiful bird lying on the tarmac in the middle of a suburban bus shelter. We moved it to the undergrowth on the verge and hope at least nature will take care of it.