Nicola Chester

Nature Writer and Activist

little owl

  • Nature Notes

    Owling. I own neither a passport, nor a house, but last night, saw 4 species of owl within a mile of home. I heard the first before I saw it. The yelp of a little owl from the farm as I walked my youngest daughter home from school. We scan the outstretched limbs of the […]

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  • Nature Notes

    Before the Snow. Winter-spring holds fast at each end and see-saws. One morning, rain strikes the cold plough at 45 degrees, whilst hail big as garden peas comes down straight as a plumb line: conjoined snowflakes fly up and down through it all. A demonstration of the weight of precipitation. The ditches are overflowing and the village […]

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  • Nature Notes

    The Stoat, the Vivarium and the White Owl. Summer holidays and my days are freer. There are some days when I can meander at will. A stoat pops up by the white barn, sees me and doubles back, like water through a u-bend. I wait. A triangular face appears; bright eyes, chocolate-drop nose, long cream […]

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  • Nature Notes

    Athene noctua. 10pm and a joyful revelation. A pair of little owls sit side-by-side on the whitened, papery branch of the stag-headed oak overhanging the field; then fly in opposite directions to resume hunting. As I creep past their oak, with its hidden hollow and ancient girth, I hear the insistent psssssht, psssssht of chicks. […]

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