Birds stocking up

I decided I would go out into our garden this morning and watch the birds coming in to feed. It was quite frosty this morning, so the last of the snow hasn't quite melted yet on the shaded part of the lawn. It was quite warm in the sun though, so it was nice to be out there. I set up my tripod fairly close to the feeders, but the birds were still coming in to feed. It was great to get such close-up views of the birds.

The first bird I saw out there was a Goldfinch, although I was unable to get a good photo, as they were a little shy to come in close to feed. A Starling, which was singing on the roof for a good ten minutes finally built up the confidence to fly down into the garden. It landed on the fat block feeder, which has been very popular recently. I was glad the sun was shining, as it showed up the various different colours of the Starlings plumage.

The bird only flew onto the feeder when other birds came into the garden to feed alongside it. The shot below shows the Starling trying to balance on the feeder.

After feeding for a while, the Starling seemed happy to just perch in the apricot tree in the sun. Maybe it would be worth buying a Starling nest box for our garden. There are definitely enough of them around.

A group of four Long-Tailed Tits visited the garden too, also feeding on the fat blocks. They are surprisingly, very tame birds around here, and are very happy to come into the garden whilst I am taking photos.

The birds do occasionally squabble, but generally, they share the feeders very well, and there is often a feeder completely surrounded by the birds.

The Great Spotted Woodpecker visited twice this morning, but I was in the house on both occasions. The Blackcaps are still around, but are sticking to dense cover, making them quite hard to see. I heard some tapping on the entrance hole of the nest box, and the light levels were flickering, but nothing came into the box.

For Christmas, I was delighted to get a ground bird table, which is now on the lawn quite near the house, giving us great views of the birds. Magpies, Robins and Woodpigeons have all been enjoying the food provided on this table. I haven't got any photos of these visitors yet, although a photo of the feeder in its location can be seen below:

This may be my last post of 2009, as we are going to Wales for New Year. if it is, happy New Year to all, and all the best for 2010!

How different it is

We have just spent Christmas with family on the south coast near Portsmouth for a few days. Spending some time in my Grandma's garden on Boxing Day just made me think how different it is there, compared to how it is in our own garden in Buckinghamshire...

One thing that wasn't to be seen on the south coast was snow- something that has been around in our garden for about a week now. Much of the rest of the UK has also had heavy snowfall (by our standards anyway) over the last two weeks or so. So, without the snow, plants were much easier to see in the garden. Surprisingly, there is still plenty of colour to be seen in the south coast garden, even at this time of year.

The berries in the photo above really brightened up the border of the garden by the hedge. They were growing on small shrubs, in little clusters. The photos in this posting have all been taken using Mum's DSLR camera (Canon 450D). I have noticed that this camera is much more able to take good close-up shots of plants, but, because the zoom on the lens isn't great, I tend to use my own "point and shoot" camera to take photos of birds, etc.

Some lichens which varied in colour on a stone bird bath in the garden caught my attention too...

I was also surprised to see some tomato-like fruits growing on a small green shrub in the garden. Again, not sure of the name (I'm still useless with identifying plants).

Whilst the south coast garden is much more colourful at this time of year, I would say that our garden is getting more bird visitors. We take part in the BTO Garden Birdwatch scheme, which, in case you aren't aware, is a weekly survey of the birds which visit your garden every week. We have been doing this for a few years now, although I must admit that we are fairly infrequent in entering our counts to the BTO website. Anyway, I was truly amazed at how many new species we saw in our garden on the week starting 20/12/09. Here is our list for that week (a total of 23 species):

Blackbird (1)

Chaffinch (3)

Dunnock (2)

Great Spotted Woodpecker (1)

House Sparrow (4)

Magpie (2)

Starling (5)

Blackcap (2)

Bullfinch (1)

Coal Tit (1)

Great Tit (2)

Woodpigeon (4)

Blue Tit (5)

Carrion Crow (1)

Collared Dove (2)

Goldfinch (5)

Greenfinch (4)

Long-Tailed Tit (2)

Wren (1)

Red Kite (1)

Feral Pigeon (1)

Redwing (2)

Robin (2)

However, even though we have had lots of new visitors in our garden, we aren't getting any nest box visitors, which is something that I did see in the south coast garden. A Blue Tit pair were very interested in a nest box on a wall in the garden for a good time. The birds in our garden aren't paired up yet, apart from the Great Tits although they are all being very territorial.

I may be able to get out tomorrow morning and watch our garden birds, so that I can share some photos with you, just to show what life is like in our garden at the moment. Anyway, enough from me, I hope you all had a very good Christmas, and enjoy the bank holiday!

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas and a happy new year to everyone. Hope you all have a fantastic winter break.