Hi all :) Before completely starting a clean sheet with this blog, there is some stuff which I really want to get posted without it getting buried under all my new photos and videos. Most of it is photos and videos from last year. Trouble is, once you've got into the habit of not updating it for a while, it can get much harder to get back to regular posting again. I really would like to get back into blogging and I won't ever leave this blog for good.
Obviously, should I go on to uni next year (which is the plan), blogging is pretty much going to be impossible, mostly given that I won't have a garden to post about :D The great thing about blogging though is that its entirely your own choice how or when you post. There should be no pressure attached. I've found in the past that trying to do a post when you're not motivated to do it is almost pointless. So in the future I will post whenever I can, and whenever I feel like it really. And if we have nest box activity in our camera next box, material on that will definitely get posted.
Cheers for sticking with me, and hopefully I'll be back on track with this from now on.
So, lets kick off then... back in May when I left you, I was half way through what was looking like quite a promising camera nest box diary. A pair of blue tits had built a nest, the female laid 7 eggs, and all 7 chicks looked to be growing quickly into healthy little blue tits. Both parents were regularly feeding the chicks mostly with caterpillars which seemed to be in decent supply. Unfortunately though, the male parent seemed to disappear at a pretty crucial time. I just didn't see him after he left, even feeding in the garden. So it might have been that he'd been eaten by something but I just don't know.
Anyway, things started to go downhill from here. The female blue tit was left to find food chicks by herself and was clearly struggling. She was spending far too long out of the nest looking for food. It seemed that the caterpillars which were in good supply a few days earlier had begun to run out, and she ended up bringing in suet from the fat blocks in the garden. She also spent too long sat on the nest at times and looked tired. The chicks became obviously weaker. I don't remember exactly how long the process took, but I remember being amazed at the speed at which a previously healthy looking nest goes downhill. Sadly, all 7 chicks died in the end after what had been an intriguing few weeks.
It was great though seeing that other blue tit nests around our area had been successful, as fledglings came to feed in our garden in the following weeks. And even though our nest wasn't successful, it was our first nest box diary and it was incredible to see what we did.
Anyway, enough of that, here's a few photos I never got round to posting last year :) I think these few photos were taken around the same time as the nest box diary actually, but I just didn't do anything with them as I was so focussed on the nest box at the time:
On the hunt for worms...
That's all for now, should hopefully be posting more catch up posts like this in the near future :)
2 comments:
Hello again Joe, I’m on a bit of a catch up now too! I absolutely agree with you on everything you say here :-)
I have quite a few stories, blog drafts sitting with photos and videos prepped that have never seen the light of day which is a shame. Many I don’t want to leave out too so I do know how you feel about stuff you’ll have.
Absolutely, post when you can and
when you enjoy it and I’d think most will enjoy reading through the catch-ups blogs :-)
Blogging is changing a little with many blogger posting and visiting less frequently – but there are so many new blogs starting every day so fewer blog visits should be expected. Twitter is a great tool to use in conjunction with your blog and I see you are using it now too!
Sad to hear about your failed nestbox family but as you say it’s quite an experience to see. Nice Blackbird pics there – I love to see them in my garden.
Enjoy blogging when you can – but don’t be too hard on yourself when you don’t – go with it as and when :-D
Hi Shirl,
Thanks for the comment :) Yes, exactly! I too have a few posts lying in draft mode that have been there a few months. Problem is, I can never remember how I intended to finish off those posts, or what I meant to say, etc. So when I finish them off, its sounds all unnatural from the point I left off. Having said all that, I am enjoying doing these catch up posts as I just hate the idea of all these photos and videos etc. sitting around on my computer doing nothing.
And yeah true, it can be hard to keep track of all the new blogs. Its definitely a good thing that there are so many more people in the community now though. Just shows how many people in the UK especially that want to share the wildlife they see here. I think this country is quite unique in that respect :)
It was sad to see the nest box fail, although I'm also very happy that we were able to see anything at all- they only started nest building quite late on, and I had given up on the box being used at all at this point. And even then I had to carefully transfer the camera to the box, which wasn't an easy process. So all in all I consider it a bit of a bonus that we saw any nesting activity last year to be honest :D
And yeah will do, I hope I stick to it for now though. Thanks again :)
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