Proof of existence.

[sister_luck]

When I was a kid my father spoke in awe about a wood outside of the town where my cousins lived: "At the ponds there, if you are very lucky, you can spot a kingfisher." I was very interested in the natural world and so I wanted to know more about this special bird. I was told it was rare, caught small fish and that it was very colourful - bright blue and I must have been shown a picture or drawing at some point. I remember a visit to this special wood where the kingfisher lived but of course we didn't see it. I was angry that human beings were endangering its habitat by destroying natural streams and ponds.

When my colleague said that in her lunchbreak she had gone for a walk along the river close to my school and she had seen a kingfisher there, I was a little jealous. By this time I had been living for at least a year not very far from school and the river and I had never seen that elusive bird.

The closest I had come to a kingfisher had been drinking kingfisher beer!

But two years ago, in February, I saw it sitting in the big weeping willow at the pond. With the usual greenery missing the kingfisher's silhouette and its orange-and-blue feathers were clearly visible. I was so proud that I even took to twitter:

Oh and sunshine! A kingfisher! Two herons chasing each other! Playful dogs! Non-idiomatic swings and roundabouts!

— SistaRay (@sista_ray) February 17, 2013

Twice:

Saw a kingfisher today. Internet taught me abt 'halcyon days' + Alcyone. New to me! Despite taking Latin in school, reading some Ovid!

— SistaRay (@sista_ray) February 17, 2013

Ever since then I've stayed on the lookout. It's easier to spot in winter, but I have also seen it when there were leaves on the trees in spring or summer. Most often it was sitting on one of the low-hanging branches by the willow pond, but occasionally it presented as a bright turqouise-blue arrow darting along the river. I had also seen it at the smaller pond where the big trees are, close to the fire station. My family didn't quite believe me - least of all my father, because it is such a rare bird and it is not like we're living close to a nature reserve. Yes, there is a small wood and a park, but this is most definitely a residential area with some industrial pockets as well. At some point I managed to take an out-of-focus picture where you sort of could see a blurry blue silhouette of something that could have been a kingfisher or possibly a scrap of a blue bin bag. The kid was the first one who saw it, too, one afternoon when I had picked him up from kindergarten and we made a playground detour. (There is a small playgroud near the willow pond, with a set of swings, a slide, a merry-go-round and that climbing spider web thing.) Another blurry picture later and all of my family believes me. Dad and kid have seen the kingfisher, too, several times. Whenever I take along the long lens, the bird stays elusive.

Until today:



I'll keep looking of course, for a better picture - more in focus, getting a little closer or a different angle.

But it is not the picture that counts - what is important is the mere fact that it lives here on the outskirts of the city and has not disappeared from this earth as I feared it would when I first heard about it in the early 80s.