Desperate for half an hour outside after rain all weekend, I shot out at the first sign of it drying up. I’m glad I did. I was amazed to see so many swifts, swallows and martins feeding very low to the ground, obviously feeling the same as me, cooped up by the rain as they were out in force. Flocks of linnets, a stonechat, yellowhammer and other songbirds also joined in. The close-up encounter was the best view ever of a roebuck. I woke it up as I approached an overgrown scrubby corner and somehow it didn’t recognise me as a person, more a gate post, I stood very still! Only 30 yards away I watched it for 10 minutes through binocs I didn’t dare lower. It felt face- to-face, its little two- pronged antlers laced with grass, its pink tongue protruding to lick its side and having a good scratch with its hind leg, then feeding nonchalantly. Eventually my arms had to move and I thought of getting a photo. That did it. Even slight movement changed a ‘gatepost’ into a human and it was off, the most graceful beautiful wild thing I’ve seen in ages, amazing what you can see in half an hour in your local patch. I drew this from memory afterwards in my notebook to record what was anyway an unforgettable experience. The thing about 30 days wild is that it is making me register and remind myself of what can be seen and felt in nature every day, not just now and then, but this encounter felt like a true one off, something special.