On a somewhat chilly morning in early May, I'm here for the dawn chorus, that glorious springtime phenomenon that never fails to enthral and stimulate the senses of anyone fortunate enough to experience it first hand.

With my back to a dark, rather foreboding wood, I hope to hear the first heraldic call of the skylark. Instead, the silence is broken by the thrilling clarion call of the song thrush. As if waiting for a signal, other birds, now fully awake, join in, like the assorted musical instruments for the symphony orchestra in concert, but all blending together as an integral part of the whole harmonious offering.

Nearby a tawny owl murmurs, and deeper in the wood another answers. All at once I'm surrounded by a wonderful, all pervading sensation, drenched in quadraphonic sound.

Now robin comes in and in the woodland fringe two chaffinches chatter away at one another with hardly a break between each rollicking delivery. I'm almost deafened by a wren so close. What a big sound for such a tiny bird. A flight of cackling Canada geese. Three fly overhead, winging their way to a nearby lake. Then several crows begin cawing on the wind.

Great tits call, pigeons coo softly in the tree tops and the laughing yaffle of a great spotted woodpecker echoes through the tree tops and close by

Slowly I walked back towards the wood causing a number of rabbits to scurry into the into the hedgerow.

My ears strained to listen each to each newcomer as it adds its own distinctive voice to the chorus. A nuthatch pipes up while on either side, black caps singing their strident liquid songs perched high on hawthorns.

Protesting loudly, two starlings flutter into their nest hole and I catch sight of a nut hatch hanging upside down on a gnarled oak.

At the height of the singalong I add to my list great and blue tits, coal tit, dunnock and chiff chaff. Strolling back to the meadow, a willow warbler's sweet cadence issues from scrub in competition with the white throat, but it's hidden in an extensive bramble patch.

Now at the mist-shrouded meadow, not a breath of air stirs the cool air.

Then walking onwards to my left the golden sun breaks through a latticework of distant leaf less oaks.

Slowly, the sun rises above the ragged tree tops, transforming the scene before me.

Beams of light flood horizontally across a narrow band of translucent mist hovering a few feet above the meadow, base and top so clearly defined it resembles a thick white ribbon stretching for hundreds of meters in either direction.

Below, the dew-laden turf glistens, with a million points of spider webs shimmering. Seemingly reluctant to fly above the mist, three skylarks began to sing as they walked rapidly, only yards away. So I sit mesmerized.

I wrote that piece way back into 1999. If I visited the same area now, the chorus would be a mere whisper of 23 years ago. What a horrible state we're in.