Country diary: A chiffchaff has swapped north Africa for this icy reedbed | Richard Smyth

Old Moor, South Yorkshire: After the early January freeze, the valley is creaking back to life, with stoats, sparrowhawks and a surprise survivorWinter is letting go its grip - for now, anyway. The hard freeze of early January relented somewhat this week; here in the wetlands of the Dearne Valley, the ice sheets drew back a little, if only a little, and a streak of dark clear water opened up by the far shore. A crowd scene developed: wigeons, tufted ducks, shelducks, a chorus of cormorant families on the bank, and, beyond them, on the grass, the heavy black bodies of coots, grazing in a herd like miniature water buffalo. A drake pintail moved elusively through it all like a reluctant celebrity, given away only by his crisp white shirt-front.Away from the lake, this is a landscape of streaks, striations, cloud and sky, snow and willow, grass and ice. Finches are feeding busily in the alders, among the derelict birds' nests. In the quiet ponds, thickets of reed have been warped by the weight of the weather. Shufflings and mutterings near the waterline turn out to be the ice beginning to yield. A small snow of down feathers drifts from the upper storeys of an electricity pylon: a female peregrine is plucking her prey up there, balanced awkwardly on the second crossarm. Continue reading...