Birds and garden visitors...

[Basil.B]

Got a couple of Fieldfares in the garden, been visiting since Christmas Eve. They come for the apples on the Crab apple tree.

 

[surfdude]

the wife let the rabbits out for a run in the garden and a few minutes later a massive bird of prey landed in the tree at the bottom of the garden eyeing them up .

 

[albal]

the wife let the rabbits out for a run in the garden and a few minutes later a massive bird of prey landed in the tree at the bottom of the garden eyeing them up .

oohhh they like rabbits.....

 

[deptfordmarmoset]

A question about great tits. There's a large and increasingly successful number of great tits around here - and as they get more and more successful their loud-but-tinny two-tone territorial call gets ever louder in the Spring. Recently, however, they seem to have started another call - this time on a single note (approximately the same pitch as the lower note of the springtime call) and it's slightly less insistent. What puzzles me is that I haven't noticed it before and it's really not the mating season. Does anybody know whether this mid-winter call is due to the recent scarcity of food and snow-cover, with the birds having to re-establish their territories? And whether this is typical because, although it's just possible I simply haven't noticed it before, my hearing is generally pretty good. It doesn't seem typical for here.

(I'm on a council estate with a reasonable amount of trees and grass for an urban area.)

 

[rich p]

Great tits have a wide varietybof calls. Bill Oddie once said if you're not sure what it is, it's probably a great tit.

Alarm calls, mating etc. Classic one is the rusty gate sawing sound.

Maybe you're just noticing more now they're more prolific.

 

[twentysix by twentyfive]

Great tits have a wide varietybof calls. Bill Oddie once said if you're not sure what it is, it's probably a great tit.

Alarm calls, mating etc. Classic one is the rusty gate sawing sound.

Maybe you're just noticing more now they're more prolific.

+1
Blue tits have a variety of calls too.

And birds have "accents". So if your Great Tits have come from somewhere else the call may sound different. Classic one for me was the "Bullfrog" bird call I heard in Austrian woodland. After much hunting I finally discovered the call was from a Chaffinch. I can now make out the bullfrog bit in British Chaffies as I've heard both. But first time around it wasn't half confusing.

Today a lovely party of ~10 or so LongTailed Tits passed thro' stopping to feed on the peanuts.

 

[colly]

One morning earlier this year I found a peregrine falcon eating what

looked like the remains of a pigeon in the back garden.

 

[twentysix by twentyfive]

Wow - wonderful colly. Pigeon is indeed favourite food for peregrines.

IMHO we need more peregrines to clear the pests that Wood Pigeons have become.

 

[deptfordmarmoset]

Cheers, Rich P and 26x25. I guess it's either that I've only noticed it because they're so prolific or because they're only doing it because they're so prolific. I'll have to keep an ear out to see whether the call shades into the mating call towards the end of the winter.

Slightly off topic, but I just saw a hare in the wastelands of east London - it ran across my path. I don't think I've ever seen one before in London.

 

[rich p]

Cheers, Rich P and 26x25. I guess it's either that I've only noticed it because they're so prolific or because they're only doing it because they're so prolific. I'll have to keep an ear out to see whether the call shades into the mating call towards the end of the winter.

Slightly off topic, but I just saw a hare in the wastelands of east London - it ran across my path. I don't think I've ever seen one before in London.

It won't be there again, mate....

...hare today, gone tomorrow

 

[twentysix by twentyfive]

Cheers, Rich P and 26x25. I guess it's either that I've only noticed it because they're so prolific or because they're only doing it because they're so prolific. I'll have to keep an ear out to see whether the call shades into the mating call towards the end of the winter.

Slightly off topic, but I just saw a hare in the wastelands of east London - it ran across my path. I don't think I've ever seen one before in London.

That's good news I think. If hares can adapt to those habitats they might survive the lack of habitat in the countryside.

 

[Rewind]

In the last few days a fieldfare has appeared in the garden, am wondering if it is the same one that visited last year. It's a feisty bugger! It keeps chasing the blackbirds away, but suppose it must be hungry after flying all the way from Scandiwegian parts.

Have also seen a lesser spotted woodpecker dangling off the fat peckers.

Am just pondering the blurb on bird seed that says "attract species x by putting y in the garden". If you've never, ever had a particular variety of bird in your garden is it really likely they're going to spot whatever it is you've put out, and start visiting?

From no birds a couple of years ago we now have green parakeets, francolins (desert grouse), collared doves, turtle doves, all manner of finches and a couple of escaped budgies. If you put any sort of food out it seems that birds will come along. We have not yet managed to attract any insect eaters though, probably because we don't put insects out......

 

[Chrisz]

We had this fellow drop in for breakfast earlier on this year

First course on the conservatory roof, dessert on the lawn

 

[threebikesmcginty]

Waxwing spotted in Hook Norton yesterday.

 

[twentysix by twentyfive]

Waxwing spotted in Hook Norton yesterday.

Was it at the bottom of the glass?


Seriously - good spot. They have been around this winter.