Not quite what I was looking for

A trip to Wendover woods occupied me yesterday. I went in the afternoon, and unfortunately, the place was quite busy, already reducing my chances of seeing some wildlife. It was busy, mostly because of picknickers, but as soon as we had walked a short distance from the car park and picnic benches, it was a lot quieter on the paths. The woods are great for birdwatching, and renowned for being home of a very special and rare bird: the Firecrest. However, I later found out that there were only 10 breeding pairs of Firecrests in the entire forest.

We arrived in the early afternoon, and walked on the nearly 3 mile-long "Firecrest Trail". According to the leaflet about the place, the tiny birds are heard more often than seen. They make a very high-pitched song. Unbelievably, we heard a song matching the description of that in the leaflet, but we later found out that it belonged to another very small bird, the Coal Tit. From a distance, I have to say that I thought that it was a Firecrest. With a closer look through the binoculas, I saw not just one Coal Tit, but at least 10 of them. Coal Tits are known to prefer conifer trees, and these woods were mostly conifers, as you can see in the photo above. Coal Tits are beautiful birds, but they are quite common, so it was no real surprise to see them. Firecrests are very rare where we live, so it would have been great to see one. Throughout the walk, we ended up seeing hundreds of them, along with a suspected Sparrowhawk, and some Long-tailed Tits. But no Firecrests. It was difficult to take a picture of the Coal Tits, because they were quite high up in the trees, and more timid than most that I see in our garden.

Below are some photos and illustrations of Coal Tits and Firecrests from the RSPB website. Shame they are not from my camera! Firecrests look very similar to Goldcrests, which sometimes causes some confusion.

Top image taken by me at Wendover Woods, and all others are from the RSPB website.

The birds have returned...

...Well, kind of anyway! The sun is out and the birds are singing. Funnily enough, since the last post about the disappearance of the birds, they are starting to return slowly but surely. However, they are awfully shy, and it has really been difficult to capture these birds on camera. A Greenfinch has showed interest in the bird food and seems to be visiting again (see picture below). I have still only seen one at a time, but its a start.

I have had quite a busy week and have struggled to get out and watch the birds, but I have still noticed a definite increase in the number of birds visiting. They seem to only take brief visits to the feeder perches, as the great tit video shows below. I haven't seen a Goldfinch for a while, but I hope the other birds encourage them to return. I re-arranged the bird feeders after I took the photos and videos below in the hope that the less popular ones will now get used . I also topped up the tables and feeders so we should get some more visitors. With the cooler, wetter, unsummerish weather we've been having before today, the bird bath has been quiet.

Below is a picture of the solitary male Greenfinch seen over the last few days. It, like everything else at the feeders usually stays for a maximum of about 2 minutes before flying off. I could not get very close to this Greenfinch, and had to take the picture from the house. Chaffinches have continued to visit in reasonably large numbers, spending quite a lot of time feeding at the seed feeder at the end of our garden.

Even the House Sparrows are quite timid, and don't appear very often. I say this but they are still visiting often. I think this one is quite young as it has a slight gape on its beak.

A Sparrowhawk is visiting a lot at the moment, which could have caused this Great Tit to be unusually timid. However, it really wasn't happy with me getting close to film it which was a bit strange. Earlier on in the year, the Great Tits were much more tame, so I'm not quite sure why this one is. The photo is a little dark (even after a bit of editing), and my camera shook around a bit while I took the video, but it still gives you an idea on what is happening. At the start of the film the Great Tit is "hiding" in the bush near our feeders, before eventually hopping onto the feeder perch. Even then, it only showed itself briefly. In part of the video, the Great Tit appears to be nervously peering around the side of the feeder. Very strange behaviour indeed!


I will soon post on our messy, overgrown garden.

All photos and videos above were taken in our garden

All quiet at the bird feeders

I was quite busy today. I woke up this morning and thought I would go outside and do a spot of birdwatching. I was a bit put off by the miserable weather, but decided to go out anyway. So, I walked out at about 9:15am with my camera and a pair of binoculars only to find... well, nothing actually.

I was patient and gazed at the empty feeders with patience, but honestly there was absoloutly nothing. I went back indoors, and got a drink. I then thought I would give it another shot about half an hour later. So, I strode out again, and this time I had a bit of luck. I saw a Dunnock, followed by a Blue Tit, 2 Great Tits and a Coal Tit. I struggled to get pictures or footage, but the Dunnock finally stayed long enough for me to record it.

Over the last few weeks there has been a much less activity at the bird feeders and tables. The Greenfinches have disappeared completely. I wonder if the poor weather is putting them off?! This hasn't been the case in the past, and somehow after some serious thought I don't think this is the cause of the problem.

There has been a cat visiting our garden recently, which could be scaring the birds off. However, when I was outside, the cat wasn't there and there were still no birds. I do also know that birds are moulting at this time of year, which could mean the birds are less active. I'm just confusing you and myself now.
I wonder if this is the case elsewhere in the country?

Have a good day and fingers crossed, I can get out to do some more birdwatching.

Cornwall holiday post 3 (other)

Welcome to the last post about our holiday in Cornwall. During the week I noted many different types of animal. The week was packed with walks and cycle rides, which gave me the opportunity to take pictures of things which I haven't seen at home. While our garden provides great undergrowth and wilderness, it doesn't have many flowers which attract bees and butterflies. Cornwall did have this, and I took some pictures of several types of Butterfly.

Top left: Speckled Wood, Top Right: Red Admiral, Bottom Left: Meadow Brown, Bottom Right: Gatekeeper

Some other interesting creatures were also seen in Cornwall that week. See below. The Dragonfly must have been injured by a swallow or something because it landed on the drive and stayed there for a bit. My uncle picked it up carefully and it sat on his finger. Eventually, after I got some pictures of it, we put it on some grass in a field. The beetle in the picture was just in the road when we saw it. The fungus was seen on an uprooted tree which I walked past. Finally, the dog belongs to the farmer who owns the cottage. They aren't very wild but they were lovely dogs. There was another one too, and they were very friendly.
Top left: Bloody Nosed Beetle, Top Right: Common Hawker Dragonfly, Bottom left: Hairy Stereum Fungus, Bottom Right: Kimmy the dog

Overall, I had a great time in Cornwall, and the wildlife made it that much better.

Cornwall holiday post 2 (the plants)

During the week, we visited many plant-friendly places. Cotehele again, and another very special place which is explained a bit later. The picture I took below is a classic example of the neat, well kept patch of National Trust property. I would really like to learn a bit more British plants, so that I can do more posts on them. We had a great day at Cotehele. We had lunch and a pleasant walk around the grounds. The property is near the river Inney and Tamar. There is a great water mill there which produces flour. I definately reccommend it.

On Thursday, we went to the Eden Project. I don't know anyone who has been, but I am sure some of you have. The effort that has been put into the building and planning for the Eden Project is immense, and I reccommend that you pay it a visit. It is very impressive to look at and it is quite surreal. It is comprised of 2 domes or "biomes" (one with a Tropical environment and one with a Mediterranean environment), an education centre called the core, and a white tent/stage in the middle. It is interesting to look at foreign plants as opposed to native plants sometimes.
First, we visited the Tropical Biome The plants vary from little to large, green to reds and browns. The Biome was quite busy, but pleasant. It was very humid, and occassionally, my camera lense steamed up!

This plant is the biggest and smelliest in the world according to the Eden Project website.
A view of the biome from a high position:

Lizards, Frogs and Insect eating birds have all been placed in the Biomes to control the numbers of insects and other pests. Here is one of the Lizards (it is very well camouflaged):
This greenhouse even had a life-like replica of a Malaysian house. It was very real, and I must admit, it makes some of the British plants look very small.

We then went to the cafe, and I had a very delicious vegetable pasty there. After we had eaten, it was time for the Mediterranean Biome. The temperature was a bit more like the British climate. The plants were a bit smaller generally and the plants were a bit less colourful (with a few exceptions), but they were still great to look at. There were more fruit bearing trees here, as well as Cactus, shrubs, and others too. Here are some of them:

This video shows an overview of part of the Mediterranean Biome at the Eden Project:

Cornwall holiday post 1 (the birds)

I have been unable to post for the past week because I have been on holiday! I will spread the writing over 2 or 3 posts because there is simply so much to talk about. We went to Cornwall, and stayed in a lovely cottage with family quite near a town called Launceston. The weather was rainy all week, like it is everywhere else, but we still had a really good time. The cottage owners were very nice and the countryside surrounding the cottage was fantastic. Even without bird feeders and birdboxes on the cottage, there were still plenty of birds around. Generally, I have to say that a lot more people in Cornwall feed the birds than they do in Bucks. Its not just birds either. There are insects, frogs, bats, plants and more.

First I will talk about the birds. Swallows were the most common sighting throughout our stay. They were everywhere and I noticed several nesting sites nearby. One was in a National Trust property called Cotehele. The nest was in an archway, and both Swallow parents were feeding some chicks (I'm not sure how many there were). The picture shows one of them looking quite tired after a quick burst of constant feeding!

This pic is of a group of Swallows which breifly landed on the roof of the building:
Another little bird was seen in large numbers, but this time a much more common bird. The Blue Tit. This might not seem very exotic but I wanted to illustrate just how many of these there were. Firstly, again at the National Trust property there was a large group of Blue Tits feeding on a fat ball. There were youngsters too. See picture and video below.

I managed to get a much better video player (blip) which shows everything in much better detail!

The picture of the Blue Tit below really did amuse me. Near our cottage, there was a little bit of building work going on. This meant that there was scaffolding around the half-built building. The Blue Tit was flying around and then landed on a scaffolding chube. It then crawled in, stayed in there for a bit, poked its head out and flew off again! The little bird must have been looking for insects or something when it did this, although there is a possibility that it was actually nesting there.

There are a lot more Buzzards around in Cornwall than in Bucks. The Red Kites in Bucks could be outcompeting the Buzzards. I didn't get a picture but I saw them frequently throughout the week.
On Wednesday, we went to Plymouth. The weather was at its worst, and I was only able to take my camera out a few times during the day. I only saw gulls and House Sparrows during the day. Here is a picture of a Black-headed Gull:

A first for everything

Most years, we get plenty of Ladybirds in and around our garden. My dad grows a crop of vegetables every year. The crops attract large groups of Blackfly and Aphids that the Ladybirds would normally eat. This year, the veg is growing as good as ever, and there are thousands of Blackfly and Aphids. But where have all the Ladybirds gone. I have seen only 1 so far this year (which I have pictures of below). I saw it crawling across our lawn. Even this one didn't look very well. It stopped for a few minutes on a dead leaf, which allowed me to fetch my camera.

So where have all the Ladybirds gone. Well, I did a Google search to see if I could find anything of interest. I searched "seven spot ladybird being outcompeted", and clicked on the first result (a Wikipedia page about the Seven Spot Ladybird or "Coccinella septempunctata". Towards the bottom of the article, I saw a little part, which said, "In the United Kingdom, there are fears that the seven-spot ladybird is being out-competed for food by the Harlequin Ladybird". I have proof! And, having seen the picture of the Harlequin Ladybird on Wikipedia, I know that I have seen this type of Ladybird in our garden and shed. I wonder if others have found this pattern too? Leave a comment on this topic if you wish.
Here are the photos:


Harlequin Ladybird. The colours are known to vary widely, so you may not see one like this. Picture from Wikipedia.

Seven Spot Ladybird in garden:

I thought I might just add in a quick note about some interesting and unusual birds seen in our garden over the last week or so. We have had the usual visitors such as House Sparrows, Blue Tits, Great Tits, Robins, Chaffinches, Greenfinches, Goldfinches, etc. But we also had a Sparrowhawk fly over the garden and land on a nearby greenhouse. It then flew over 2 more times in the next few days (including once today). A Great Spotted Woodpecker also visited and took some fat. I have only ever seen Coal Tits on their own, but yesterday I saw a group of 3 take it in turns to feed. They really don't stay long. Unfortunately I didn't get a picture of any of these rarer birds, but I hope they give me another chance by returning.