My view of Nidderdale

Four years ago, we moved into this house in Easingwold, North Yorkshire. Our street is at 90degrees off the main road, the Thirsk Road. The next street also is at 90degrees off Thirsk Road, so our rear garden shares a boundary with a house on the second street. That house has a much larger rear garden.

When we moved in, that house had a screen of mature trees on their side of the boundary. Last year, the owners took down nearly all of those mature trees, sold the land and another house has been built.

In this photo, the house on the right is the new house, the trees behind are similar to the mature trees that were taken down. The roof visible on the left belongs to my neighbour's house.

With the felling of the trees, the variety of birds has fallen, for example, we used to have siskins in our garden, we don't anymore. The felling has an upside. From our bedroom window, on very clear and sunny days such as yesterday, the distance view is of the Yorkshire Dales.

We can now see across the Vale of York all the way to Nidderdale, a distance of around 25 miles. As the saying goes, every cloud has a silver lining, but I would like to see a couple of siskins now and then.

A siskin