Monday 15 March 2021

Skylark versus Merlin - Skylark evades capture, How?

 



It came back to me this morning whilst out vismigging, remembering one special occasion down in the Grane Valley, Haslingden, East Lancs. Probably from around the mid 1980s, I would set up my old bivvy to keep out the winds and would sit in the entrance looking out, it was quite remote were I did vismig in fields with little conifer plantations, occasionally a noisy car would pull up on the nearby main road and guys would jump out and go in search of magic mushrooms which they successfully found. But that is not really the point of my memories. They are from that day when I saw and heard a Skylark in much distress has it was being chased along the moorland edge by a Merlin, I watched them for about 100 yards and the Skylark suddenly went into a ascend in short spirals, just like a Skylark does, the Merlin also tried to catch the bird, but his spirals were far to large and could not gain the same speed of ascend, and soon the Merlin gave up whilst the Skylark lived to see another day. How clever nature can be.