Please check your antivirus software

The news yesterday that the deadly H5n1 avian flu virus has been found in a dead swan in Cellardyle in Scotland sent shivers down my spine. First, because we lived in the 1980's near the beautiful Fife coast, and know the damage to tourism and the economy that this news will cause. And secondly because our house here in rural Norfolk is surrounded by poultry farms, and in Germany the virus has spread from wild birds to poultry.

But, if possible in this situation, let me offer a little humour. I was puzzled as to why there had been a sharp increase in visitors to one of my articles on Peter Maxwell Davies in the last few days. A quick investigation uncovered that it came out quite high on Google searches for dead swans in Scotland. To find out why follow this link.

Staying in Scotland, and staying with positive news, I wrote recently about the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra on a roll. The BBC Scottish players are currently on a South American tour, and you can read cellist Anthony Sayer's account of the tour on his blog via this link.

Image credit - Waterfowl.fuzzup.net. Image owners - if you do not want your picture used in this article please contact me and it will be removed. Report broken links, missing images and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk
If you enjoyed this post take An Overgrown Path a long way back to Conference of the birds

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