It certainly wasn't Spring where I was. I chose to head North West into Harwood Forest on Sunday morning. The snow in the fields became more obvious as I passed through Scots Gap. I was out early and already had a couple of new species 'on my list' for the year with a drake Green winged Teal at Bothal Pond and a female or 'redhead' Smew at Bolam Lake.
I was hoping that I might see some Common Crossbill amongst the pines and perhaps a Grouse or two around Winter's Gibbet. When I arrived and stepped out of the car it was to several inches of roadside snow. The moors were a mosaic of heather poking through a white blanket. Mist hung above some of the plantations and clung to the darker rides of the forest like exhaled breath. The silence was crisp. Birds were few and far between. I failed to see any Grouse or Crossbill, the silence only broken by an occasional Chaffinch. and the noise of flowing water as every beck and stream swelled, full with snowmelt.
Even the corvids normally the hardiest of creatures were lower down the slopes in places where there was exposed grassy areas. I was surprised then to hear a Wren calling in an area of clear fell close to the road as I trudged back to the car. One of our smallest birds and obviously one of our hardiest if this individual was anything to go by.