I’ve been called some things in my lifetime but rarely Cottontail! Now Beatrix Potter is a wonderful writer but as with all writers of nature she takes a position, let me explain… My granddaughter is currently obsessed with the stories of Peter Rabbit, in fact on some of her visits lately she insists on being called Peter and I have to be Cottontail. I do remember the occasional squirrel in Singleton Park when I was young but like the foxes, squirrels now seem to be everywhere. The wildlife has always been there its just that because so many of us have been working from home we’ve been more available to see it. Others say that it’s a side effect of lockdown. I can still remember birdsong as one of the highlights of that awful few months. That was certainly true about the birds in ‘Lockdown One’.
Some people say it’s due to the reduction in human activity because of lockdown. I’ve had a bird of prey in the garden attacking a crow and I regularly hear the woodpeckers tap, tap tapping and occasionally see them too. It’s not just foxes I’m seeing more often, last month we had to call the RSPCA to come to rescue a baby badger in distress and during the long summer evenings, once the sun goes down its just a matter of time until the bats come out. It shows just how unusual that was, I mean I was in a Rolls with Elton and going for supper with Bernie and the fox is one of my strongest memories of the evening!!! Anyway, I digress…Įlton was driving us from his house in Virginia Waters across Wentworth Golf course when suddenly a fox ran across our path. The meal was being cooked by his wife Maxine who was the inspiration for ‘Tiny Dancer’. I was in a Rolls Royce Corniche being driven by Elton John heading for supper with the lad who wrote his lyrics, Bernie Taupin. Now you know I’m not one to name drop but…. We had frogs and lizards and of course the occasional horse running down the street followed by a couple of likely lads but foxes? In fact, I remember the first time I ever saw a real fox.
When I was a kid growing up we did have wildlife. Who was this flexible friend with attitude? Mr Fox. He then proceeded to sit down, scratch the back of his ear with his leg before finally wandering off into someone’s garden. In fact, the way he looked at me gave me the impression he wasn’t too impressed that I was on his street. He just stood there staring at me as I walked up the road.
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