Yesterday evening I saw a red kite.There are also woodpeckers, wrens, chaffinches, blue-tits, great-tits, robins, dunnocks and thrushes and probably lots of other birds I wouldn't recognise. There are kingfishers here too, I've been told. On the canal itself, swans, ducks, moorhens, coots and cormorants are all doing well here. I saw great-crested grebes and tufted ducks on the lakes. There are muntjac deer in the woods. Nearby, a Dog Rescue home has volunteers walking the dogs through the woods, along the towpath and around the lakes. But this area is just one place that the HS2 will be slicing through. I see the little tragedies of ruined nature repeated all along the line, completely insignificant to the planners, the profit-makers.
Sunday, 21 April 2013
HS2 - Slicing through
So far, the planned High Speed rail link between London and Birmingham (then Manchester) has been a vague idea on a map for me. I knew it was going to cut through the Chilterns and all for a few saved minutes of travelling time. But this morning, it all became more real for me as I sat out on the bow of the boat with my breakfast. I'm moored up alongside an area of woods, wetland and lakes and the birdsong is just lovely now that spring is here. I heard a cuckoo, an increasingly rare sound in this country, then had an extra treat of watching it fly across to other trees.
(borrowed from the rspb site)
Yesterday evening I saw a red kite.There are also woodpeckers, wrens, chaffinches, blue-tits, great-tits, robins, dunnocks and thrushes and probably lots of other birds I wouldn't recognise. There are kingfishers here too, I've been told. On the canal itself, swans, ducks, moorhens, coots and cormorants are all doing well here. I saw great-crested grebes and tufted ducks on the lakes. There are muntjac deer in the woods. Nearby, a Dog Rescue home has volunteers walking the dogs through the woods, along the towpath and around the lakes. But this area is just one place that the HS2 will be slicing through. I see the little tragedies of ruined nature repeated all along the line, completely insignificant to the planners, the profit-makers.
Yesterday evening I saw a red kite.There are also woodpeckers, wrens, chaffinches, blue-tits, great-tits, robins, dunnocks and thrushes and probably lots of other birds I wouldn't recognise. There are kingfishers here too, I've been told. On the canal itself, swans, ducks, moorhens, coots and cormorants are all doing well here. I saw great-crested grebes and tufted ducks on the lakes. There are muntjac deer in the woods. Nearby, a Dog Rescue home has volunteers walking the dogs through the woods, along the towpath and around the lakes. But this area is just one place that the HS2 will be slicing through. I see the little tragedies of ruined nature repeated all along the line, completely insignificant to the planners, the profit-makers.
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4 comments:
Cuckoos? Bluddy squatters - hang 'em, flog 'em!
I heard a cuckoo at Greenford this year, first time in ages. Let's hope they're starting to make a bit of a comeback. Unfortunately, this sort of thing just doesn't seem to matter to those who are only interested in making money from getting trains to go a little bit faster.
Maybe if they learned to slow down a bit instead, they'd come to appreciate what they've got around them.
Tony
Hi Tony
Maybe that cuckoo is a touring, single cuckoo on a string, doing the rounds for the Tourist Board each Spring ;-)
Carrie
I feel the same. I saw a barn owl on the canal the other week. Take it all in while you still can.
Im movin me barge to Ireland soon..more open spaces less progress...the bog canal beckins my floating wanderings.
peace fellow boater
Only just seen your comment, anon friend. Mmm... boating in Ireland..sounds lovely. any chance of you sharing the experience in some online form?
carrie
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