Green Woodpecker

Another dull, grey day - where has summer gone? Again, I tried to get on with marking, but only managed six papers before boredom set in. On a positive note, I received confirmation that my latest report was just what the client needed, so that's one project all wrapped up.

The highpoint of the day was a visit to the garden by a male green woodpecker and two young. The younk birds are very attractive, with gently speckled plumage that provided quite effective camouflage on mossy tree trunks. They spent some time investigating the trunk of our pollard willows, and one of the young briefly appeared on our patio, though soon realised its mistake and flew off. Green woodpeckers are fairly frequent visitors to the garden, but this is the first time we've had three at one time!