There are coots on the canal. My knowledge of birds is rather patchy, but the one thing I had managed to absorb about coots, along with how to recognize them, is that they are quarrelsome little fuckers. Well, this afternoon – just after dark, I nipped out the back of the office for a smoke, and there were three coots in the water: two males, fighting, one female, egging them on, and a supporting cast of ducks looking on, appalled. The fighting had already started when I arrived, and it was still going on when I finished my cigarette and it was far too cold to hang around and watch anymore. I’ve found a few pages describing this deplorable behaviour, the best of which is here. It describes American Coots, which look a little different about the upper beak to the local variety, but the fighting I saw was very much like the description. There’s also a pretty good picture of coots fighting here, but it didn’t reduce terribly well, so I used a more placid illustration.
UPDATE: I’ve just been telling Sarah about this episode over the phone, and she advises me that one of Arthur Ransome’s Swallows and Amazons books was called Coots, or something like it, and sure enough, here’s a 1935 dustcover of Coot Club from here. A-and here’s a cheesy sig tune to go with it, which is frankly not recommended at all.