Birds in their little nests agree

As he repairs a fence that's gone floppy thanks to the cattle rubbing against it, John Lewis-Stempel pauses on a warm April morning to admire all the birds busily building and lining their nests with cow hair

- John Lewis-Stempel

How fresh the air the birds how busy now In every walk if I but peep I find Nests newly made or finished all and lined With hair and thistledown and in the bough Of little hawthorn huddled up in green The leaves still thickening as the spring gets age

The Pinks' [chaffinches') quite round and snug and closely laid

And linnets of materials are loose and rough...

From 'Birds Nests' by John Clare

MIZZLY morning. Half misty, half drizzly. So, mizzly. Not quite Chaucer's April 'shoures', but a white veil across the valley and a slippery shaft to the sledgehammer. As. I. Bang in. Chestnut staves. To support. A. Fence. It is a fence that requires a little explanation. Or apology, being five quick and cheap horizontal strands of barbed wire along the side of the cows' night paddock. Somewhat surprisingly, the Limousins find the spiky barrier the acme of scratching devices, rubbing their 1,500lb bodies along it with total, sighing bliss. Once in a while, the fence fails in its heavy-duty beauty provision; this morning, some staves have snapped and a 15-yard stretch is performing a Fosbury flop. Hence the sledgehammer, the fresh new staves and the steady echo thud of steel-head on wood-end. An old agricultural sound.

The work is not unpleasant; the weather may be damp, but it's warm and the honey scent of the last blackthorn blossom can be tasted on the tongue. From an invisible perch lost in the stratosphere, a skylark pours silver song over me.