Hoop, hoop–oeray!
This fine fellow flashed through my sightline at lunch with our friends George and Hilary today.
In mid-conversation I caught a glimpse of the headdress outside the window at the back of the house and it was gone before I could say: “There’s a hoopoe!”
Nobody would have believed me, anyway.
Hoopoes are well known for their shyness and we have never seen one near the house.
On the tarmac outside and once in the garden, rising vertically like a helicopter to the nearest tree branch but–my word–never this close!
Back from tropics, it’s their time of year and it always thrills me to see them again.
Then Meredith says, with an intake of breath from the opposite end of the table: “Look! Look! There’s a hoopoe at the window, trying to get in!”
I turn slowly and face the courtyard.
There is this exotic creature hovering at the window–appearing to knock on the pane with its long beak–“let me in, let me in!”
Where’s the camera? Can you try? Oh my word!
Meredith finds the camera and gingerly opens the front door. The flustered creature, now at another door, obligingly turns its head and stays put long enough for Meredith to capture this shot.
Why was he/she trying to get inside?
Will it be back tomorrow?
On verra!
Robin Ellis 