CycleChat Springwatch!

[Rezillo]

You are so lucky. We have had one every year for 8 years or so, but not the last two years. Also had one at work and that disappeared two years ago too and all our house martins. Had loads of nests 8 years ago and they have got less and less and now we have none

All our species have had their ups and downs over the years. This year's comeback has been the greenfinches, which all but disappeared a few years ago. We have far fewer tree sparrows than we used to - it was common to have 50 or more at one time, with the shed roof board just one long line of sparrows. A pair of turtle doves first turned up four or five years ago but only a singleton in the past two years.The ducks are a bit of a pain this year as they are deterring the smaller ground feeders. There are swallows and swifts nearby but not many martins about.

At the moment, they are all wolfing down food to feed their broods - those feeders empty in two days!

 

[hopless500]

All our species have had their ups and downs over the years. This year's comeback has been the greenfinches, which all but disappeared a few years ago. We have far fewer tree sparrows than we used to - it was common to have 50 or more at one time, with the shed roof board just one long line of sparrows. A pair of turtle doves first turned up four or five years ago but only a singleton in the past two years.The ducks are a bit of a pain this year as they are deterring the smaller ground feeders. There are swallows and swifts nearby but not many martins about.

At the moment, they are all wolfing down food to feed their broods - those feeders empty in two days!

Greenfinch numbers not recovered in our garden. I record numbers for the BTO so get quite a good overview of what's going on. Loadsa tree sparrers anyway, not quite so many house sparrows, but you can hear them squabbling nearby!

 

[rich p]

This is the first year since we have lived here (16 years) that we have had neither blue or great tits nesting.

 

[Spinney]

Our regular visitors at the moment are gangs of tree spadgers, greenfinches (up to 8 at a time), goldfinches (up to 8 at a time), a pair of yellowhammers, pair of pied wagtails, pair of dunnocks, pair of robins, a turtle dove, assorted collared doves, pigeons, a crow, a jackdaw, pair (one at a time) of great spotted woodpeckers, a jay, a green woodpecker (eats ants on the lawn), up to nine wild mallards, blackbirds, chaffinches, blue tits, great tits, long tailed tits and various magpies. In the past couple of days, two families of newly fledged starlings have occasionaly mobbed the feeders.

That's a serious quantity of feeders!

 

[deptfordmarmoset]

Ok, it's no longer spring but, as I didn't have a camera on me, it wasn't worth starting a new thread.

Sitting outside Fat Boys Diner at Trinity Buoys Wharf with the Sunday London Idlers, a little egret flew by. That's a bird no one would have seen over London 10 years ago. Anyhow, I've never managed to get a good picture of an egret so I'm asking if anyone else has managed to snap one.

Egrets, I've seen a few, but then again, too few to photo...

 

[Cyclist33]

Egretfully not. I have seen a great egret though, near winchester. That was a storking point!