What fascinates us down here, on the edge of the Pyrenees, is the change from one winter to the next. Two years ago we were over-run by siskins all winter, last year just one for one day. This year we've seen a couple this week, but that is all.
Three years ago we had 40-50 bramblings every winter's day. That same winter we were taken to a brambling roost way up in the mountains, where there were reckoned (by the experts) to be 10 million, ye I do mean that, bramblings amassing every evening. It was an amazing sight. We had to walk an hour upwards on a tiny track, then come back afterwards in the dark! Last two years there were none, apparently because the beech trees locally had virtually no nuts, although we did have one lone brambling that came daily with the chaffinches and goldfinches, perhaps it got confused as to its identity! This year we have a good number of bramblings in the garden, and we hear that there have been about 1 million at the roost. We haven't managed to get there as I'm trying to be sensible, having cracked a bone in my ankle three weeks ago - it is mending well, so I mustn't be tempted!
