Last weekend outside

Some of the birds are happy for me to be out and about in the garden with them. The best was the siskin. This pic has no zoom on it. I was standing ever so still less than 6 foot from it. I stepped closer and he moved to the other branch and "shrieked" at me until I stepped back.




The bullfinch was a little more nervous but tolerated me


The nuthatch was happy flitting back and fore. He likes the new feeder the most. He has the most gorgeous eyes of any bird.

Just a little peek

The lady blackbird has such great colours

The coal tit likes the fat (and doing acrobatics)

Someone didn't like the rain hahaha.

Today's Visitors

A most welcome visitor today. Mr Bully. No sign of Mrs Bully, though. Hopefully she is in the nursery tending baby bullies. I'd never seen him on the floor before.


Mrs Chaffinch was about, but he didn't like her getting too close to him.




I captured a blackbird on the fence. He was staring me out.


And I thought by putting the feeder under the bush would deter the collared dove, but nope.

Collared Dove and friends

The collared dove had decided that he didn't want to eat off the floor. So he started jumping on to the feeder tray to munch.
Then he sussed he could easily reach the ports.
The feeder was quite solid on the branch with its' metal handle, so I took it off and tied it to the branch with some string, thinking that when he lands it will swing and he'll lose balance.
The next morning, I looked out to see him happily munching away, no problem.
So I moved the feeder to underneath the bush, thinking he'd not get enough room to fly to it.
But I came home to see him munching away. Although I did see him try to get on later on. If he didn't get it right, it would be a bit awkward for him and he'd give up. So a part result.




I have now got 3 greenfinches, although they won't stray from this feeder.


I now have a male and female goldcrest. The male has an orangy stripe while the female's is yellower.


I also have the two nuthatches flitting in and out all day.






"I'm looking at you"


I was especially pleased to get my monthly visit from the bullfinches.

March Visitors

After an incredibly quiet few days it was like Picadilly Circus in the garden.I think I had 15 species in 30 minutes.
I had 10 starlings, collared dove, greenfinch, nuthatch, 5 siskins (numbers well down), 6 or so jackdaws, goldcrest, robin, blue tit, coal tit, one goldfinch who wouldn't let anyone share "his" feeder, dunnock, woodpecker, about 7 blackbirds and 3 chaffinches.

I was in stealth mode, so managed to snap the robin




It must be amazing to eat something that is so much bigger than you.


The starlings were out in force today

More snow

After the snow on Tuesday, we woke up again to some more snow on Thursday. MrJoo set off to work at about 7, but I decided I'd wait until after rush hour. As it was, it was rather quiet and an easy trip to work.

The garden does look lovely in white.


You can't see it, but there is actually the GSW in the lower left of this pic on a fat cake

RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch

Today was the RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch

Since I normally get a decent amount of birds first thing, my hour was 9:35 to 10:35. (I wasn’t quite ready for 9:30 but that worked out well
My count
1 dunnock
4 starlings (quiet today)
11 siskins
4 blackbirds (although I saw 3 male and 2 female, there were only 4 at one time)
4 crows
1 blue tit
1 coal tit
1 great tit
5 chaffinches
4 goldfinches
1 magpie
2 wood pigeons
2 collared doves
1 gold crest
1 jay (woohoo, he was down the bottom of the garden for a while and I have a few fuzzy photos)
1 woodpecker (he returned, yippee - although I scared him off lifting my camera)
and with 2 minutes to spare
1 robin (I thought he wasn't going to turn up today.

noticably missing were :- treee creeper, nuthatch, long tailed tits.
I'd just finished my count, but there were lots of birds about when something seriously spooked everything and they all shot off. One poor siskin went the wrong way and splatted into my window. I rushed out in case it was the cat who had spooked them and to protect him, lifted him up using kitchen towels and put him the right way up, safe near the kitchen door (obviously I went back inside for my camera). I think the only damage was a bit of blood in his beak area. He flew off safely.

Later on in the afternoon I saw the tree creeper, 5 long tailed tits and 2 nuthatches. I think these are more late in the day birds rather than morning birds.

Some photos I took today:

Long tailed tit - cute as ever


Crows. I think they were having a romantic foursome!!!

This one was happy sat on next door's aerial

Until he flew off

Mr siskin after he'd gone splat. There was a bit of blood on the one kitchen towel I used to collect him, I think it was from his beak.

I think the siskins are the most common birds in my garden now.


The rear of a fat wood pigeon

And the nice side of a collared dove

Woohoo, I snapped the jay (albeit badly)

In all, a great morning counting. And also for the rest of the day.

The Morning After The Night Before

Wow, was it windy last night. I'd looked out the window and saw the candle on the floor, but then when I went downstairs to look out the window, I could see that it wasn't the only casualty.
The nut feeder was on the ground a long way from the tree and also the nyger feeder with tray had fallen and somehow the tray had cracked a bit of plastic and the bottom came off the feeder with the seed almost spilling out. So I had to go out and rescue everything. I brought the nyger in to dry and see if I could recover it (I did) and popped the big seed feeder onto a lower branch. because the tree is really a wild bush, it doesn't half sway in the winds which is why the feeders all fell off. Also, the cheap square nyger feeder that I had only filled on Friday was absolutely empty.

So this morning before going out to sort the feeders out again, the siskins were all over the floor and the goldfinches were happy on this feeder.

Hehe, I snapped the robin before he spotted me.

And the collared doves are starting to come close to the house again. For the past few months, they haven't come close (that I have seen) but this last week or so, they've been regulars