Chiltern Birder

We had our first serious frost of the season last night. I went out today and it was glorious with the later autumn colours and a light that an artist would die for. Naturally the phone had been left on charge so I oouldn't take any pictures. The frost was burning off at the start of the walk and the sun catching the moisture on an autumn sown crop revealed what looked like the trail of a giant slug across the field. Despite having watched the Horror Channel yesterday I looked for a more prosaic explanation and the disturbance at the edge of the field gave it away as a wandering badger. Throughout the walk there were plenty of signs of badger activity and they haven['t found it necessary to make any serious incursions into the gardens yet. Walking in some of our local green lanes the sun coming through the branches meant that many birds were only in silhouette. The rather exotic small black bird turned out to be nothing more exciting than a great tit when I shifted my viewpoi...

The starlings followed the same pattern as the goldfinches. Yesterday there was a solitary bird, today a flock cleaning out the fat feeder. Yesterday the feeders had been covered with long tailed tits while blues and greys have been regulars alongside the goldfinches. When I restarted feeding less than a week ago I was lucky to see the occasional robin or dunnock in the garden and I thought that I might be putting the food out far too early but I have been proved wrong. A couple of the visitors may have been one offs but the full list is: blue tit, great tit, long tailed tit, coal tit, greenfinch, chaffinch, bullfinch, goldfinch, starling, wood pigeon, dunnock, robin, wren. That pretty well accounts for all the usual regular visitors I will have to keep watch for anything more exotic.

Day 1 of feeding we had a solitary goldfinch turn up. On day 2 we had a flock, the word seems to be getting around that a new season of bird feeding has started. We also had a pair of greenfinches which was a suprise as they have been so scarce in the garden for the last few years. The finches just bite a piece of each sunflower seed that they take so a lot ends up on the ground to fatten up the wood pigeons.

I had seen a dunnock, a wren and a robin in the back garden in quick succession so I rather tentitavely put out some feed on Tuesday with a few sunflower seeds in a hanging feeder, some fat bites on the ground feeder and a fat bar in a feeder on a tree in the front. There was no sign of anything yesterday but this morning the ground feeder had been cleared so I wondered if the badgers had been in the garden. A camera trap a few days ago had shown nothing. This afternoon I noticed that some of the seed had been taken and kept watching. Soon I saw goldfinch, blue tit and great tit on the seed feeder and a robin on the ground feeder, which I had topped up. I hadn't expected any take up for a few weeks yet so I am pleased at the result and will have to order by full winter stock of feed soon.

They certainly haven't reached us yet but they seem to have penetrated into north London. I was at a funeral at Golders Green Crematorium this week and a flock was making a racket in the garden of remembrance.

I first hoped that the rustling sound under the eaves was due to nesting birds but the sound of movement across the loft put paid to that theory. I have known rats in the loft in other properties and this didn't sound quite right. Talking to neighbours the problem extended along the entire row of houses. A professional identified the intruder as that peculiarly Chiltern problem the edible dormouse. I checked my loft and found grains of expanded polystyrene scattered over the insulation out of some blocks that the previous owner had left there. I put up a camera trap which wasn't triggered and I haven't heard anything since. As they hibernate for around 6 months I imagine that I will now have some quiet nights until the spring.

During the past week the changes in colour of the trees have started noticing. This is particularly apparent when driving on the A41 from Berkhampsted to Tring as I did to visit College Lake. I don't know if this is a factor of pollution from the road or of soil and aspect, the terroir as they would say in a vineyard. College Lake itself was unexciting except for one bird of prey that steadfastly remained perched in a position that didn't give a clear view. From the size a peregrine and a hobby were both possibilities being suggested in the hide. There were still a handful of swallows around. I went to a gig in Harrow on Monday night which meant driving back through Latimer around midnight. This is always a good route for seeing wildlife at night although the best view was a fox in Pinner. In Latimer village I had the briefest glimpse of a badger's hindquarters as it vanished into the hedgerow. Sadly I had a much better view of a deceased one in Blackewell Hall Lane. This...