Skip to main content

Not All Storm Damage

We got off very lightly from the storms with one fence developing a bit of a wobble and the squirrel baffle on the bird feeder twisted until the mounting snapped. Our visiting badger seems to have made up for this though after deciding that there was something tasty lurking under my alpine bed.
I wouldn't have minded so much if it had just been the weeds that I was going to take out in the next few days anyway but I do begrudge him the primroses.

Since the storms there have been very few finches coming to the feeders and the great tits and the nuthatch seem to have moved away too. The blue and long tailed tits are still around in numbers as well as the resident robins and blackbirds.

I was getting a bit fed up with uneaten bird food on the ground so I tried moving the feeding point by about three feet. Now the blackbird comes and hoovers up the mealworms and fat pellets. The robin on the other hand has no truck with feeding off the ground and tries to imitate the blue tits on the fat and sunflower seed feeders.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Kites Spreading East

 I haven't been posting much due personal matters but still have my eyes open. One thing that has struck me is the eastward spread of birds of prey. I have seen buzzards over Havering-atte-Bower but the big suprise in the past month as been a red kite over the M25 near Stapleford Abbotts in Essex. The skys still look empty by Chiltern standards though. A nice little spot last week was a goldcrest during a visit to Kew Gardens.  I have downloaded the Merlin app which supposedly identifies birdsong. I have had little opportunity to try it out but a quck test in the garden showd that it correctly told me that I could hear jackdaws and a robin. I look forward to using it on the coast to see if it can distinguish the various waders for me. 

Not as Quiet as I Thought

 The garden has seemed very quiet with hardly any birds seen but I hadn't been explicitly looking. I have just started putting a little food out in the front and in 24 hours have seen Robin, Great and Blue Tits and Magpies landing in my tiny front garden. Yesterday I heard a song that was unusual to me which the Merlin app identified as a Blackcap. Unfortunately for me the bird was ensconsed in the middle of my Forsythia which is still in full leaf and I couldn't get a sighting. This afternoon I saw Robins in the garden and corvids overhead. I set Merlin running while I swept fallen leaves from the front path. The app identified Robin, Rook, Wren, Jackdaw, Greenfinch and Blackbird. I also heard Parakeets but not while the app was running. 

A Little More Normal

 After a couple of days of frost the garden looks more like a typical winter's day with birds visiting throughout the day. Blue tits are the main visitor plus one or two marsh (or possibly willow) tits and the occasional great tit. A flock of long tailed tits paid a fairly brief visit. Robins in the back garden have paired, seemingly a little later than the ones in the front.  Due to ill health the ivy on my back fence hasn't been trimmed and has developed a good crop of berries. The only bird that I have seen showing interest has been a wood pigeon which spent some time yesterday feasting on them. In the front I put out a fat block yesterday afternoon which, so far, has attracted a grey squirrel. The pair of robins and the occasional blackbird are active on the hanging table.