Chatty fieldfares' warm welcome

FLY-OVER It's prime time to spot fieldfares in UK skies

- with STUART WINTER

A rat-a-tat-tat of bird calls shatters the silence but not the solemnity of figures ringed around a village green memorial with heads bowed in respect.

Long after the bugle notes of the Last Post drift away in the late morning breeze, the incessant drum roll being tapped out by flocks of fieldfares heading west continues into the late morning.

Nothing hushes the constant chatter of these hefty thrushes in uniforms of brown, ochre and battleship grey as they retreat from the harshness of the northern winter.