Every morning when I get up (after 8 almost always, after 9 sometimes), I open the curtains in my room which I share with a certain middle-aged dog called Lola, open the window and look out at the day. Lola is always ready to look out, as well, because there are four cats living next door. One of the cats (Naia) almost never goes out, so it won’t be her that Lola sees in next door’s garden but it could be Viktor or either of the others whose names I haven’t yet learned. The two most recent cats are both grey. One is always ready for food when I’ve gone round to feed them, the other is much slower to come from wherever he’s hiding. Their feeding likes and dislikes are not relevant to this story, though, so I’ll get on with it!

One summer morning about four weeks or so ago when we looked out we were amazed to see a juvenile gull walking around in next door’s garden. It’s easy to tell a young gull because they have brown spots on their wings and back whereas adult gulls are white with grey wings and back and the tips of their wings are black with white spots, as are their tail feathers.

We had seen the young gull the evening before when he had enraged Lola by sitting on the roof of the conservatory. (At the moment, and as long as it’s warm enough, I spend time in here watching tv or reading.) The youngster seemed to be okay but found it difficult to stay on the ridge of the roof and ended up walking along the trough which sits between the house and the conservatory. He climbed through the balusters on my balcony and after a while, because we couldn’t see him easily, we stopped looking up and soon forgot about him.

So, there he was, sitting on the lawn in next door’s garden. We watched him for a while as he walked back and forth, extending his wings but obviously not going anywhere soon. Lola paid no attention to him once she realised he wasn’t a cat and I needed my breakfast so went downstairs.

The next day when we looked out, the gull was still next door wandering about the lawn, I was going to write a text to Simone who lives there when I received a text from her. She said she had seen the young one and was keeping her cats in so that they wouldn’t go after him.

Time went by. Every day Pepe (that’s what they called him) was still there in the garden, spending time tossing plastic pots around and eating the food they put out for him. The cats were not interested in going anywhere near him and the local foxes seemed to have found better places to go. Then, Pepe decided to go exploring in Simone’s house! The garden door was open and in he went, snooping in their kitchen/diner. Not finding anything interesting, Pepe departed, leaving a calling card in the shape of a gull poo!

Things changed! On the 1st of September, I realised I hadn’t seen Pepe for a couple of days. As if she had read my mind, Simone wrote and sent me a photo. Somehow, Matt, Simone’s partner, had put Pepe on the roof where he was joined by his mum (or dad – difficult to tell with gulls).

Pepe had been practising using his wings and going on very short flights and they hoped that, being up high, he would take to the skies. It seems that that is, indeed, what has occurred. Pepe and his parent have left the roof and flown away – possibly to the beach where, even at the beginning of autumn, there are lots of people eating chips out of cones of paper, just waiting for a young gull to swoop and steal their snack!

Fly Pepe. Soar and realise the freedom of a bird at last!

More Pepe photos thanks to Simone.