Country diary: The story of birds starts with their feathers

River Lagan, Belfast: Right now you can see winter in the black-headed gull plumage, and spring in the mallards’. Yet feathers are also vital to how birds even came to exist On my walk along the towpath , I pick up a small grey feather. It’s a flight feather , probably from the wing of a feral pigeon . I stroke it absently as I watch the birds that are swimming on the river