Sunday 17 August 2014

Roses, Badgers and Life’s Expectations.

Another week in which the combines have continued on their phonetic devouring of the Cotswold’s cereals.  The fields of gold now much diminished from their harvest colour resembling now an autumn look of a sombre brown left from the plough and discs.
My wife has had her last week of her summer holiday in which she was blessed with a visit from her sister and niece, a happy reminiscence was had by all. The next day Jackie was surprised with a delivery of a beautiful bouquet of white roses gifted from her sister and niece. A most thoughtful and generous act.  Like so many things in life, the totally unexpected can create the most joy. 
My daughter has brought a doctor friend down from London for the weekend, and as we sat around the dining table having supper last night listening to the light hearted conversations, my son Sam talking of his imminent admission into the Royal Agriculture University Cirencester, Sophie referring back to some of her experiences at her Medical School, Kings College London and her young doctor friend who has just graduated telling us of his experiences of his first week as an F1 doctor at his hospital, I couldn’t help but wonder just how their young experiences differed so very much from my own.  A life full of opportunity and expectation where efforts of work and study are rewarded with lives of fulfilment, usefulness and satisfaction.  All these things come with the hope of a better tomorrow and when you see so much of the world with daggers drawn it has got to be so much more difficult even impossible for the young of these regions, Gaza, Iraq, Libya, Syria and even the Ukraine to seriously contemplate any meaningful future.
A telephone call last week from a couple of my game keeping friends informing me that once again poachers are out and about in this part of The Cotswolds.  Now with a lot of the harvest in there is an openness across The Cotswolds that creates very little cover for the Roe Deer, Fallow Deer, Muntjac, Hares and of course my dear Badgers.  Last week I watched old Daddy Cool gathering straw for Mrs Badger to bed down the sett on a rainy night from a recently harvested field above his woodland.  Along with him in the same field I saw seven Roe Deer and a couple of Muntjacs.  They all looked so exposed out there in the open.  For the people who wished them harm, it really would not be that difficult, so I was thrilled to see last Monday, Daddy Cool bring his whole family back from the now vulnerable Northern boundary to deep inside the woodland, Daddy Cool’s stronghold normally reserved for the winter months. 
Please watch my short film of Daddy Cool’s return to his stronghold deep inside the woodland.



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