We woke to find ice on the garden pond. Under a light snowfall, the frost was deep. The first frost of the year changes everything; it pushes open the back gate to winter so that you never know who might arrive. Later that day I was tending some saplings in the fields when I heard whistling. Half old-fashioned kettle, half haunting ghost, for a good few seconds I had no idea what it was, then I realised it was a bird flock. Our golden plovers were back. My heart rose. Breeding on the moors, the cold weather brings these birds to the lowlands. Every year a flock comes to us. Their return is one of the consolations of winter. Golden plover flocks may have a distinctive call, but they can be difficult to spot. They’d passed close by, but I hadn’t seen them. Jagging overhead like