Its been a long time since:

a) I've blogged. (Nearly a month).

b) We've had any sort of warmth in the air (almost exactly a month).

c) I've seen our local barn owl (over a month).

d) I've filmed our local, breeding little owls.

e) We've had any sort of warmth in the air (have I mentioned that already?)

What a March eh? (See the comment to this blog post).

I've deliberately avoided blogging during last month, for one reason really - it was so pigging miserable and the temptation to droan on like everyone else about the cold would have made me even more miserable I think.

But yesterday changed all that - that nagging easterly calmed for a day, the sun came out (it is British Summer Time after all now) and the frozen plants and animals took a breath.... a deep breath.... we haven't broken the planet just yet it seems!

Oh sure.... waxwings are still around, as are fieldfares. There are still winter ducks and sawbills on local gravel pits (goldeneye, wigeon and displaying black-necked grebes I hear). But spring HAS to come eventually.... and it does seem now we are approaching the middle of April, it is stuttering into life.

You get the feeling that if we blink or look away for a second in the coming month, we'll miss it - and we'll end up in "summer" without realising it. It was therefore nice to notice the first dronefly in the garden yesterday and the first mining bee of the year - little things.... but important to me! (Yeah yeah.... I do have a "little mind").

My beautiful swifts are but three weeks away (in fact I heard some were seen in Spain and Paris this past week) - and the first sand martins have arrived - only to find there's b.all food for them here (one poor individual made it back to its traditional local nesting bank this week and died of hunger and/or cold - there'll be more like that I fear).

Life tries to push on though and the local pair of little owls are enjoying their ritual mutual groomage sessions on the roof of their barn. I've filmed all last week and at the end of this blog, you can watch the footage (please, as normal, maximize the embedded player and check the quality to its the highest setting for smoothest playback). Think of this footage (containing more than two surprise visitors) as the first "Operation noctua (twoooo)" clip - which I actually started on the 1st day of 2013 - after all... that's when the pair of owls returned to stake a claim to their favoured breeding site.

The local pigeons and doves are laying and the blue tits are re-investigating nest boxes after stopping for a few weeks...

The sun is out again as I type this morning after my traditional Sunday dawn drive around the local countryside. The celandines are out, the daffodils are finally finding their flowers and the crocuses look great.

No.... I've not seen our most reliable barn owl for over a month - in fact I thought two stock doves had taken up residence in its tree. But today in the most glorious dawn sunshine (well.... after dawn really at 07:31 exactly), the beautiful owl showed me it was still around and flew alongside my car, back into its tree. A lovely pick-me-up.

I doubt if it will be breeding - barn owls have a very short breeding life (we're talking a season or two normally), but I'd love it to stick around - the local countryside feels a little lonely without it these days.

Well.... I hope April brings us more warmth, some blossom - and maybe a leaf or two if we're really lucky.

Its been a long time, been a long time,
Been a long lonely, lonely, lonely, lonely, lonely time.
Yes it has.