Big Garden Birdwatch - 26 & 27 January 2008

[Paul Narramore]

Some of us carried out a bird watch of garden birds this time last year but I've been unable to locate the thread. Anyway it's on again, I shall be doing it, and for details visit www.rspb.org.uk/birdwatch

[sue1002]

I will be doing it again this year, I had the reminder through in the post last week about it. I just hope it stays dry enough for long enough to do it as the birds don't come out much in the rain.

[Paul Narramore]

A fear this year will be pretty poor. This time last year there were scores of blue tits and other breeds but even though the fat balls are out and seed containers are bulging, we have very few birds. I understand that the very wet weather and flooding has destroyed some of their diet ie grubs and worms.

[Truda]

We will also do an hour in Norfolk

[Paul Narramore]

As I feared, my count was truly poor after last year - in fact any year. In one hour, two blue tits, a robin and what I believe was a bullfinch (some distance away). Last year I seem to recall six or seven varieties. Possibly the weather is too mild so our bird table scraps and fat balls simply aren't attractive enough. It will be interesting to see what the results of the RSPB BirdWatch are.

[Truda]

One blackbird seen in one hour at Hemsby on the coast near Great Yarmouth

[sue1002]

I'm going to do it tomorrow, the weekend has been very busy here.

[Paul Narramore]

Truda, I rode my motorbike up to Lowestoft from balmy Kent the other day and couldn't believe how cold it was there. Obviously the bitter winds straight off the North Sea. All the birds were probably sheltering ;-)

Sue, That's cheating. Saturday and Sunday were the days of the count ;-)

I went to visit a friend this afternoon who has a very old and gnarled rose bush which will need pruning soon. Right up my street, and I've got the job ;-)

[sue1002]

Sue, That's cheating. Saturday and Sunday were the days of the count ;-)



I know it is Paul but we were out for most of the day yesterday and today OH was in and out of the back door and kept scaring the birds away, I had to let him so that all the bits falling off the car got fixed. At least tomorrow I will have the day to myself.

[sue1002]

The birds here this year amounted to 3 House Sparrows and 16 Starlings.

There was no sign of the usual Collared Doves, Bluetits or the Robin that usually come into the garden, maybe because half way through next door let their dog out. Last year we had 29 Starlings so that number is completely down this year.

[strangerachael]

All we ever seem to get is blackbirds and starlings. And pigeons. I have had a wren visit a couple of times this year but the chances of it appearing in the allotted one hour are slim. Oh and couple of coal tits once but ditto as for the wren. We used to have quite a few blue tits but I haven't seen any for a couple of years.

[digger]

I have great difficulty in distinguishing one bird from another, I have got a cd rom called "gardening with wildlife in mind" I know that you will all be immensley pleased that I am taking wildlife/gardening seriously but on the cd, I can't tell the difference between a dunnock and a sparrow or a house sparrow from a hedge sparrow, they all look the same, why do birds make themselves look like each other? it seems to me ,a stupid thing to do. No wonder they are going extinct ,because I bet they can't tell one from t'other either. But on a good note I have got a wild bird in my clematis montana, I saw it earlier.

[Andy]

I did the Birdwatch at the weekend but it was very disappointing, I think some one tipped the birds off because there were very few around on the day!! Maybe the sparrowhawk I saw had something to do with it as well. Still an interesting hour spent watching the garden. :)

[sue1002]

Digger, I use the RSPB Bird Identifier http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/birdidentifier/ which is a big help, you can choose by the size of the bird.

Andy, I think the sparrowhawk may have been the reason for your birds disappearing, we saw one here a few weeks ago and all the birds disappeared for a couple of days and then came back, the sparrowhawk has only ever made one visit here.

[digger]

I shall have a look at the site sue1002, thanks for the link. Sometimes the birds are too far away for me to guage their size, but I am planning to purchase a bird feeding table for the back garden, we've seen the one we like it is a little pricey but it has a real terracotta tiled roof with fancy leadwork as well and so it will make a nice feature, maybe if I can put it near to the window we can see who is visiting it.We have the wood pigeons living in the tree at the back garden and some collared doves live there as well, the tree is so covered in ivy we can't see the birds nests.

[sue1002]

It's a pity all these starlings didn't turn up for the birdwatch, I was amazed to see so many of them yesterday.

[digger]

My word sue1002, that is a serious amount of birds. What are they doing on your lawn? are they all looking for worms to eat?

[sue1002]

I don't know what they were after, we quite often get a few birds on the lawn after it's been raining but it had been dry here until a bit of rain during late afternoon/evening. I saw all the birds swooping down, grabbed by camera and ran upstairs to take the photo and a few seconds later they all flew away. There are a couple of bare patches in the lawn, and I'm hoping its not a sign that we might be invaded with leatherjackets or chafer grubs this year.

[Bluebell]

I threw some bread out for the birds last week and a little while later I looked out of the window to see if there were any takers. It started with with one or two Starlings and then suddenly loads of them landed. There were so many I started to count them, when I reached 19 they flew off (all at the same time), it was amazing!

[sue1002]

Yes, I've found the starlings do like their bread, they also love home-made fat balls made from either lard or dripping with bird seed mixed in. Sometimes I add porridge oats which they like and they adore it when I add some raisins to the mix too, they almost fight over each other to get to the feeders.

[Bluebell]

I have feeders, fat balls and peanuts but the Starlings only ever seem to eat the stuff I put on the grass. We have 3 or 4 Doves that literally fight over the peanuts though! The Jays like the peanuts too, we had 3 in our garden the other day I couldn't believe it - in the 15 years we've lived here it's only in the last month that we've ever seen Jays in the garden.

[digger]

I saw a jay in the front garden a couple of years ago,we don't see too many starlings here but we have two big fat wood pigeons in the tree at the back and collared doves, and over the lane in the hotel grounds is an owl. Lots of magpies hang around here and they go in the hen hut to pinch eggs.

[Bluebell]

It's funny you should mention fat wood pigeons because there were two in our garden this morning and one of them was so fat I'm surprised it could fly! I don't like magpies they always seem like bullies to me - I'd be livid if they stole my hens eggs. Do you have any problems with foxes trying to get the hens? We always seem to have foxes in the garden, and they use it as one big toilet (Grrrrr!).
A couple of months ago I looked up from doing the washing up and there was a pheasant strutting around by the greenhouse - I think he must have been lost! I went down the garden to take a picture but he heard me and flew off - even while I'm writing this I wonder why I didn't just use the zoom on my camera!!! :D

[digger]

Hi Bluebell, magpies are a pain for nicking eggs one even took an egg out of the bucket once they were collected,to deter magpies from going in the hut through the "pophole" hang a chain or piece of balestring down so that it will touch anything that goes in or out, it works magpies don't go in if the string is there. That method was told to me by an old chap one day ,after he saw me sitting in the the field with my gun for most of the day!!. Foxes are a real nuisance and we have had regular attacks, even more so now the hunting is not carried out as often, at one point the attacks were happening in daylight,one man lost 31 birds in a single afternoon ,foxes just kill for the sake of it. It got so bad that i publicly offered a cash reward for the body of the fox, Two days later the fox was delivered in a bag shot dead of course, now we have the same chap to go round the land every couple of weeks. When the hunt was in full swing if any hens were lost the hunt would pay compensation to the owner of the lost hens and the hunt would deal with the fox, the payment was not so much a compenation,but to ensure that we didn't go and dig the fox out and shoot it, they wanted their hunting fun, now losses are putting small livestock keepers seriously out of pocket.