DESK-WEARY, one afternoon, I headed towards the small loch in the woods, in search of its latest arrivals. Word was there were cygnets to admire. It had been a while since I was here. Over the autumn and winter, tractors and trucks were at work near its banks, felling, stripping and clearing trees, which they then stacked by the path. Those of us with fires and wood-burners eyed them with envy, wondering how many logs you could get out of a single trunk.

The cygnets are not the only recent arrivals. My panic at the disappearance of the Belted Galloways a while back proved baseless. They had only been moved to a higher field. I spotted them, huddled in the rain beneath a pylon, as if tuning into Test Match Special. Now, there’s a scene from a Katie Morag story: a field of heifers with their woolly calves, which grow sturdier every week. They are so round, they could as easily roll down the slopes as walk; their white midriffs look as if they’ve been freshly painted, compared to their mothers.

The other afternoon, while we were chatting with a neighbour at the garden gate, a roe deer and her tiny fawn bounded into sight across the fields. The doe leapt the fence like Darcey Bussell, leaving the fawn to scramble through rather than over. Flushed by a dog, they suddenly spotted its owner and, realising they had gone in the wrong direction, turned and raced past us again, before disappearing into the woods.

All around there are so many young things at the moment, you have to watch your step. I came on a sparrow fledgling in the garden, and gave it a wide berth. An hour later it had disappeared, presumably back to its nest. The entire length of the beech hedge has been turned into a neonatal ward. A porthole has been punched in it, where harassed blackbirds dive in and out, tending to their brood, while the blue tits are running relays. The occupants of the nest-box are surely getting ready to show themselves. I know people dread the day all their children leave home, but I bet these birds are counting the hours.

One morning an exhausted sparrow was sprawled in the sun, soaking up the warmth. A blackbird joined it, spreading its wings and going into a sort of trance as the sun beat down. You’d think these creatures were solar-powered as they lie there, recharging themselves for the fray.

In recent weeks it’s the starlings who have put on the brashest display of family life. There were seven bobbing on the field gate at one point, dull brown things that make such a racket you wonder why anyone moves to the country in search of peace. Once fed, they take flight, giving daring aerial displays. Dozens of them sweep low over the field, then surge off like bees at some invisible command.

After the excitement of the skies, they come back to ground. Some settle on the rumps of the sheep, who carrying on grazing while they peck nits – or the sheep equivalent – out of their fleece. Overhead, swallows flit unnoticed, doing trapeze acts on the telegraph wires. There they don’t just look the height of elegance, but are safe from earthly dangers too.

Because, despite the bucolic air of early summer, predators do not sunbathe. Mostly they arrive after dusk, but one stalks these parts by day as well as at night. After breakfast, a neighbour’s cat can be found under the hedge, watchfully waiting. Who can blame him? – it’s what cats do – but I always hope he goes hungry until a tin is opened. He won’t, of course. While some cats resent the effort that goes into the chase, this one is a feline Hemingway, never happier than when he has prey in his sights.

For swans, which it’s illegal to kill, since they are the property of the Crown, their only serious predator is the fox. Overhead cables are another hazard, as the composer Peter Maxwell Davies once learned. When he lived on the island of Sanday in Orkney, he came on the corpse of an electrocuted swan. Rather than waste it, he gave the wings to the local school for their nativity play, and turned the rest into “a delicious terrine”. The police caught wind of this, and appeared with a search warrant. Only when they had passed the remains of the bird through the metal detector at Kirkwall airport, and found no evidence of shot, was he off the hook.

Fortunately no wires overhang the woodland loch, so on that front our swans are safe. When I got there, feeling dusty and hot, I made quietly for the edge of the water. A good distance away I saw a swan, and it saw me. It started to glide my way. I took a path, out of its sight, until I reached a clearing. By now the cob was in the middle of the water and, turning in my direction, began to swim towards me. Waves lapped its breast, and I could hear the thrust of its feet. I thought it was moving rather fast, but clearly it was not fast enough.

Suddenly, there was an explosion of noise as it reared up, webbed feet slapping the water as if on a runway, until it landed with a splash right in front of me. I didn’t move, wondering if it was going to fly at me with its enormous wings. When I was child, my mother warned me always to keep my distance from swans, telling me about someone she’d known whose arm had been broken in an attack. She had lots of good stories like that. But instead of going for me, this one trod water, watching me from the corner of its eye. Then, perhaps satisfied I was harmless, it drifted off. Caught unawares, a flotilla of mallard ducks paddled furiously to get out of its way. It was like watching the QE2 descending on a string of rowing boats.

Further up the bank, the cob joined its mate. Around them, five dove-grey, downy beauties appeared to be velcroed to their side. I crept off, hoping they stay far enough from shore that any passing fox cannot not reach them.

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