I live near a big estate that breeds pheasants for game shooting, and for several years my garden was visited by a succession of male pheasants. Eventually they’d be tame enough to eat from my hand, and sometimes they’d bring their lady friends along. One day there were 15 pheasants in my garden.

I don’t see them any more because I stopped feeding birds altogether, after one of my neighbours got a predatory cat and I started finding corpses, mainly small songbirds. These days it’s just wood pigeons and magpies, none of which seem inclined to make friends.