Disaster!

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The magpies have found the nest Mrs Mallard had chosen an excellent place to make her nest, very well hidden and difficult to get to, concealed under a sedge plant at the edge of the pond. And when she’s sitting there she’s practically invisible. But of course she has to leave the nest now and then to eat, drink, and go to the toilet, just like the rest of us. And the magpies were watching. I swear there are far more magpies around these days than there used to be. In the old rhyme ‘One for sorrow, two for joy’ seven was for a secret never to be told because it was very unusual to see so many. In fact it wasn’t that common to see two. But nowadays they seem to be everywhere. At some point in the afternoon when she was away they had got to the nest and taken an egg. And of course once they have found where it is, all they have to do is watch and wait until her next break and then go back for another. The second day I was actually sitting in the garden under the grapevine. I popped down to the pond to see if she was on the nest, and she was, then I settled down to work. It’s not possible to see the pond from where I was sitting, and when she comes and goes she is of course quite surreptitious about it… a while later I heard magpies making a lot of noise and wondered what was going on, then a few minutes afterwards I saw Mrs Mallard come flying in, she had obviously been for a break. And when I went down to look I found this at the side of the pond – a broken egg shell surrounded by blood spatters