11 May 2001

I'm sitting in the Hazeler looking out at quite a drab sky though it's not cold. I am watching the jackdaws coming and going to their chimney nest. Those jackdaw chicks must be real hungry because the time between mouthfulls is anything between 30 and 40 minutes. They must be starving. In the meantime the swallows are ducking and diving and swooping all over the place up and down the canal and the adjacent fields. It's bright now until almost 10 o'clock and I think that's why those birds come here to breed. It gives them a longer feeding time than if they were further south and presumably the food they want is here as well. A swan flew past the Hazeler the other day quite low. He was moving to a new spot on the canal closer to Clondalkin. Probably around the 12th Lock.