Richard Williamson's Country Life, January 19

I once met one of the most beautiful women I had ever seen, and made the mistake of telling her so. In a thick Scottish accent she replied: "That kind of remark goes in one ear-r-r and out the other-r-r". Well we all do foolish things sometimes and it can't be bad to bare the soul.
By The Newsroom
Published 16th Jan 2006, 14:59 BST
Updated 8th Jun 2018, 03:09 BST

Then I found out her passion, and I was even more intrigued. It was diving ducks. Even more precise, the goldeneye. So I called her the goldeneye girl and thought she could have made her fortune in a James Bond film. It was a long time ago, but even now the mere glimpse of one of those exquisite ducks reaches parts that no other duck can reach. There were eight recently in Fishbourne creek for instance, and a dozen in Nutbourne channel. They are glorious little birds far out in the deepwater channel, the drakes showing their brilliant white flanks and indigo-black backs.

The goldeneye girl studied the breeding ecology of these birds in a Scandinavian forest for several seasons, shinning up the bare trunks of pine trees to giddy heights with the agility (but not the looks) of a monkey. For it is in the trees that the goldeneye nests, usually in the hole made by a black woodpecker.

Richard Williamson's Nature Trails appears every week in the West Sussex Gazette. To read the full version of this column see January 19 issue

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