Big Garden Birdwatch

We always used to do it so we are getting in some practice to do it again in 2023 - the RSPB''s Big Garden Birdwatch.-

We always knew it as the 'big bird count' ('big' as in lots of people and cats taking part, not merely counting the big birds).  

And you don't need a big garden - or in fact any garden - you can do it in the park, or on a roadside or out in a paddock we guess.  Recording where you count the birds matters because it is 'doing science' about what kinds of birds there are, where they are living and how many of them there are.

This morning we had starlings.  We started with two a couple of weeks back and they have been inviting their friends so we are up to somewhere between 12 and 20.  If they carry on like this we won't be able to count them on bird count day.

They do formation flying which is quite cool.

Blackbirds are also out there - just one pair as they are territorial.  Robins are also territorial.  We have seen some terrific aerial robin battles as they settle disputes over who has this territory in our back yard.

Sparrows on the other hand are super communal and we can't count them either - more than 20 perhaps.  They fly out of the blackberry next door and sit on the fence taking turns to mob the feeders.  

Only when the sparrows have retired from the field do the tits appear - blue tits and common tits.  We have fewer of them, but about once a day (usually in the afternoon or early evening) a flock of long-tailed tits flies through, landing in the flowering apple tree to scour it for small insects and availing themselves of the suet balls in the feeders.

Mr B has seen a wren scuttling across the bark of the tree, pecking at small bugs, and we have previously reported on the woodpecker and the sparrowhawk that visit.

We've never seen this before.... it looked like one crow grooming the other one.

As far as BIG birds go we still have three crows, but we saw them chasing off another three crows last week.  They clearly have territorial issues as well.  Unfortunately the wood pigeons don't have territorial issues and our lawn sometimes hosts 8 or 10 of the voracious warblers, scavenging about for anything that falls from the feeders.  We had to 'pigeon-proof' the feeders otherwise they knock all the seed onto the ground and waste most of it.

A pair of magpies also flit in and dance around the crows from time to time trying to get a share of the suet pellets thrown out on the lawn for big birds that feed on the ground.

F and Mr B have developed a kind of tick that has them rushing out and flapping their arms when the squadrons of herring gulls turn up each morning.  They seem to use the crows as markers of where the food might be found on the ground and come mobbing in.  The crows chase off the magpies, and have aerial battles with any raptor that shows up but they don't seem to challenge the gulls these days, and haven't worked out that the humans with flapping arms only come out when the gulls arrive and are no threat to crows.

I remain calmly aloof, watching, counting, biding my time.  Mice sneak out of the warmth generated by the compost heap and dine on fallen seeds and morsels of suet.  When the weather warms up a bit I shall sit under the cotoneaster near the compost bin and wait..... patiently....

We have had to do a bit more squirrel proofing, but seem to have foiled the brazen thief at last and he was last seen doing barrel rolls under a passing car out the front before racing off up a tree on the other side of the lane.  To give squirrels credit, they can jump prodigious distances from trees on our side of the stream to trees on the other side and make their escape through the hedgerows on the other side into the parkland beyond.