"A nice cup of tea and a long sit down"

That was what my mother's usually said after a strenuous period of housework, shopping, gardening or whatever. Well, after two strenuous days on Barn Owl business, I am definitely in need of my mother's remedy. I have now made four boxes from two military boxes, and yesterday (Friday) Peter and I put up two of them in barns, one in Chettisham, one in Prickwillow. We also put up a box made by our colleague Dick N, made in fact out of offcuts. That went into a barn in Witchford.
Today I started by looking at some existing boxes in Witchford, not put up by us. They had not had Barn Owls breeding in them, and when I saw the boxes and their location, I wasn't surprised. Anyway, all that can be remedied. One of the boxes is the size of a small Wesleyan chapel with a Swiss chalet-style roof, you know, the kind that has a huge overhang to keep the snow off your boots. That big bogger is going to be wedged in an old pear tree across the field.
I then went to Dam Bank on Haddenham Fen to cut an access hole for Barn Owls in a barn where we installed a box a couple of years ago, in order to give the birds an alternative escape route if they are disturbed.
Then I went to Gall's Farm on North Fen where there is a box in an open barn, bred in only once. My mission was to see about putting a second box in a closed barn nearby. Having checked the closed barn - a roosting owl flew out, always a joy to see - and pronounced it very suitable, I went to check the existing box and found it on the ground half smashed. Why would anyone want to do that? It's just mindless vandalism. Anyway, I took the box home, repaired it and have just put it back on the beams. I discovered while struggling with it that I don't have the strength in my shoulders that I used to have, so it took me a long time, with several pauses to get my breath back, to push it ahead of me up the ladder and wriggle it into position.
And now I am having a nice cup of tea and a long sit down.