All about the birds...

7th January 2016

It was a bit of a traumatic morning in Silverdale today. As I was sitting at my computer behind the counter I heard a thud at the door. When I looked out there was a bird sprawled out on the path outside. He flopped about a bit then was still. I feared the worst so I went to have a look. He was right in front of the door - so no-one would have got in without stepping on him. I went out and could see his eyes were open and blinking - but he wasn't moving. I gently gathered him up in my hands and folded his wings back in place - they did not seem bent or broken. I could feel his little legs kicking as I moved him onto the grass to recover. His feathers were so warm and soft.

Taking a break from studying birds

I kept looking out of the window anxiously to see if he as moving yet - but he just lay where I had placed him. I didn't know the best thing to do - so I looked it up on the internet. The advice from the RSPB was to place the stricken bird in a safe, dark place to recover. It said broken wings or legs were rare from window collisions - so to make them comfy and let them recover for a couple of hours.

After a while the rain started to bucket down and my poor little blackbird was getting soaked. I got a box and lined it with newspaper and an old scarf and went out to rescue him again. This time however, he was looking a bit more perky and as I approached and he hopped away from me and then flew up into the tree.
I was so relieved to see him back to normal!

Some of the class

Ironically - it was the Birdwatchers' day in the library too! Every Thursday afternoon they use the rooms at the end of the library for their WEA Study of Birds course. They close the window shutters at the bottom end so that it is dark in the room and have slides and films of birds. Some weeks they are missing - when they go off on a field trip - to put into practice what they have learned, I guess!


Fun Times!

I popped into their room while they were having a tea beak and asked if I could take a photo - and they were very obliging! 


My Blast from the Past today is from September 2012 when we had a Brazilian Drumming Group in the library to show us how to drum! I had a go too - and over 20 kids and parents came along too. It was such fun and quite a revelation. The session was run by Mika and Leandro, who were great at getting everyone involved and making the session fun. We were each given a small stool to sit on and a drum to hold between our legs. Mika told us that the drum was called a Timbre and we could get two distinctive sounds out of it. One was called a Tone - which was obtained by hitting the drum on the edge with your fingers and letting them bounce off - the other is called a Bass and obtained by hitting the centre of the drum with the flat of your hand.

We have certainly done some interesting and varied things in the library over the years!