Nature

We live in a fairly large compound, which had quite a lot of trees when we arrived, and has even more now. So we find we don't have to go far to see "wildlife", though it isn't quite the lions and elephants people immediately think of when you mention Africa. At the moment we have a lot of nests close to our house. Here's a dove sitting on her nest just under our roof. Doves make what seem to be quite scrappy nests, just enough twigs to stop the eggs from rolling away.



If you look carefully you should be able to see a slightly yellow coloured ball of grasses in this next photo. This is a red-cheeked cordon bleu (that's a bird!) nest just outside our bedroom window. It was lovely to watch the tiny birds arriving with individual sprigs of grass in their beaks.



And the architectural marvel of little weaver bird nests. If I were designing a nest, I would never think of putting the entrance hole at the bottom...!



This fellow amuses me. From the kitchen window, I can often see him sitting by an ants' nest, having an "eat all you can" buffet. What a life!



And this magnificent dragonfly was sitting on our washing line last week.