Very cute and more than a little cheeky, a delightful number of little robins entertained me with their antics as I walked through the woodland at Forest Farm Nature Reserve today. With such a bright red breast these dainty charmers are instantly recognisable, and one look from those overly large beady eyes is enough to make me kick up a pile of leaves so the robins can search for a worm or two.

As the autumn leaves get blown away by the first storms of winter, robins seem suddenly to appear in greater numbers – is that just because we can see them more easily in leafless trees or have they returned from a long summer holiday to remind us that Christmas is just around the corner?

Of course, robins are often depicted on Christmas cards, reminding us that, when sending cards first became popular in the 1860s, Victorian postmen wore uniform red waistcoats which earned them the nickname ‘Robin Redbreast’.