The Heart of the Valley would die en route the following year. Her offspring also migrated though five of them also died but the one raised by the dunnocks survived. The mother dunnock died the following winter during a cold spell and was eaten by a fox. The surviving male dunnock mated the following year and had six offspring. The story ends with the writer taking a walk in the valley. The author once narrowly missed hitting a bird whilst driving to a railway station. On the train journey he imagined what might have happened if he hit the bird and it became the starting
Bird colony (Enantiornithes), in sediments from the Late Cretaceous (Maastrichtian) of Romania. Approximately 13% of all bird species nest colonially. Nesting colonies are very common among seabirds on cliffs and islands. Nearly 95% of seabirds are colonial, leading to the usage, seabird colony, sometimes called a rookery. Many species of terns nest in colonies on the ground. Herons, egrets, storks, and other large waterfowl also nest communally in what are called heronries. Colony nesting may be an evolutionary response to a shortage of safe nesting sites and abundance or unpredictable food sources which are far away from the nest sites. Colony-nesting birds