Blog
25/02/2018

Just in Case

Binoculars and Bird Books
There really is no reason for you to take binoculars with you for an appointment at the Brompton Hospital.  After all Chelsea isn't exactly a birders paradise however this was a mistake.

Arriving too early for my appointment we went for a walk around the streets off the Kings Road.  In the distance we saw birds high in a tree, a charm of Goldfinches, approaching we counted 13 birds with more over the roof top.  But were they Goldfinches, they looked like Goldfinches with their slim shape and their flighty movement but something was wrong and we couldn't put our fingers on it.  We went through a list of birds they could be but to no avail.  They were forty feet up in a tree, too far away for our aged eyes to discern details.  Oh for a pair of binoculars!  In the end we left disappointed that we hadn't been able to identify the birds.

By now the bitter cold was biting through so we headed off to the warmth of the hospital, turning into Chelsea Manor Street we put up two Ringed Neck Parakeets eating apples from the pavement which had fallen from a tree overhanging a fence   There were three more eating the very large Russet type apples hanging from the tree.  They were soft and juicy, more like pears and the Parakeets were really enjoying them. It was a perfect picture, the green bird against the russet coloured fruit and they were so close but alas there was no camera. 

I know that not everybody likes Parakeets but it's lovely to see these exotic birds on the streets of London.