April 15th – On my commute home, on the Walsall Canal. in a disused, fenced-off wharf arm off the mainline, a mother swan watches me carefully from her nest in the reeds.

It may look a bit polluted, but she’s fairly safe there: there’s a palisade fence and factory yard around, and it’s a brave fox would try to get to that nest.

Security. It’ll be interesting to watch her progress.