Wednesday, Nov 17th, 2010

Heavy rain overnight - and still some coming down when we went out at 7.10 a.m. At least it was a bit warmer, even though the wind was coming from the East at some point and thus was a bit ... cutting ...

We went back into the tennis courts again today, as there was now no danger of slipping and sliding.
The ravens were rather uncertain about what we meant to do! They flew from the cherry trees into the big field, on our left as we walked along the footpath.
I didn't walk straight to the entrance gate across the grass because it was very muddy underfoot and I didn't fancy being towed along by Miss Sophie and then being made to say hello to the mud, face down ..., seeing that I did not use her restraining gentle leader again, today.

In the courts I was very pleased to see that Miss Sophie is now much more attuned to where I am regardless of the distance - and she did come much faster, even when getting into one of her 'can't hear' modes. I think my walking away from her when she doesn't come is working.

The ravens followed us from the big field into the tennis courts - first flying onto the top of the fence, then swooping down to sit on the nets. It looks funny when they land on the nets because they need to balance against the wind, and the top of the net is quite thin to grasp with their feet.

They picked up their titbits in their usual, shy manner.

Today, one of them got chased around the courts by Miss Sophie! She didn't stop until she'd chased him round the whole five courts - not listening to me at all.
However, I got the suspicion the raven rather enjoyed this - he fluttered in front of her, just high enough, and at a distance where she couldn't catch him, but not flying up onto the tall fence in a panic. In the end, he did just that, and Miss Sophie finally listened and came back to me ... aww, still lots of work to be done here, methinks!

No other ravens came, and except for one duck and, later, a couple of seagulls, no other birds flew across.