JEAN Heywood (chairman) opened the meeting by welcoming members and visitors.

She mentioned the fact that both the skittle evening and the guild outing to Monmouth and Kentchurch Court had both been enjoyed by members.

Mrs Heywood then introduced Graham Granville to give a talk on falconry.

Mr Granville brought with him three of his owls.

The first was Fluffy, the barn owl.

He said that there were only 3,000 breeding pairs left in the wild.

Amongst other interesting facts, an owl has a 25 per cent better vision than humans and its ability to fly silently was being studied by aero structure technologists.

The other two owls were a little owl called Squeak and a South African barn owl called Ebony.

Little owls were introduced into this country from Greece 120 years ago.

Ebony was part of a breeding programme as this type of owl is extinct in the wild.

The next meeting of the guild will be at Bromyard Road Methodist Church on Thursday, September 15, at 7.30 pm. when Adrian James will talk on Bodenham Arboretum through the seasons. Visitors are welcome to join us.

ELIZABETH CHAMBERS