Kites and Driving at Night

I have one feeder on the go at the moment but from what I saw in the garden today I think that I am probably feeding more squirrels than birds. The weather has been mixed with clear skies alternating with short sharp bursts of rain. I did see a dunnock perch on top of the feeder but they always feed at ground level.

It shouldn't have been surprising really but for the first time ever I saw a kite from my own front path. He circled over our street for a minute or two and then seemed to be caught by the wind and suddenly whipped away without any apparent effort.

In clear weather last night I was struck by the view of the escarpment from the Lower Icknield Way. With no lights visible the effect is of a strange brooding shadow against the sky. The drive itself was not particularly exciting with just a glimpse of a fox.

Comments

Usual Suspects

With some cold dry weather there has been a lot of activity on the feeders this weekend. With three different robins visiting the garden there have been fewer fights than I would have expected. The sight of the weekend has been a robin regularly visiting the starling feeder with a pair of beady eyes peeping over the top of the fat bar. As I had run out of sunflower hearts I topped up the ground hopper with pinhead oatmeal which seems to have been very popular. I even had a song thrush inside the cage which is a first. Althogther the weekend has included goldfinches, chaffinches, great tits, blue tits, coal tits, marsh/willow tit (I must learn how to distinguish those), blackbird, song thrush, robin, dunnock and wood pigeon. Unusually for this area a heron also flew across the garden during the day. I haven't seen any long tailed tits or greenfinches around here for a while and there wasn't a single house sparrow around during the weekend.

More Starlings

At least one brood of starlings have been regular visitors to the feeder and today the fledglings got the hang of taking the food for themselves. Other broods must be less developed as adults were still taking away quantities of fat. The tits aren't so common at the moment, I don't know if this is because they have dispersed, if wild food is available or if pressure from the starlings has driven them off. Single blue tits are dropping in fairly regularly and a coal tit took fat away as well. The woodpecker seems to have become a regular visitor and still has a brood to feed. He definitely comes before the starlings in the pecking order and keeps them off the feeder until he has finished. The new feeder with perching rings is popular with the chaffinches and the goldfinches, the latter suddenly seem to prefer the high energy mix to the nyjer seed. With all this demand for feeding young ones the fat is going down very rapidly and I am putting larger quantities out on the ground t...

Easter

As well as the usual suspects the last couple of days have given us visits by long tailed tits and coal tits. The real treat, however, was a house sparrow in the tree at the bottom of the garden. They come to that tree very occasionally but I never see them on the feeders. I had to make a trip to Bristol today. Being behind the wheel of a car isn't the best location for birding but on a long journey there are a few that can be recognised. Kites were in evidence between Great Missenden and Oxford as usual and I also saw swallows on a phone wire. I know that they have been around for a while but somehow I seldom get to see them until later in the season. In the Cotswolds I saw two buzzards, curiously both were being attacked by a single crow. On the return a lapwing flew across the road between Oxford and Thame, and a few minutes later a grey hawk like bird which I would put down as a possible cuckoo.

Chiltern Birder

Search This Blog