My Garden Birds

The birds were very busy feeding in the garden this morning with flocks of Goldfinches and Greenfinches visiting the garden feeders and pairs of Long-tailed Tits, Blue Tits, Great Tits, and Blackbirds all looking as if they are pairing and starting to set up territories. All three of the Dove family - Rock Doves, Wood Pigeon and Collared Dove, pair of Dunnocks, Robin, Chaffinch, Song Thrush and Wren (too fast to photograph!).. Also visiting in recent weeks Tree Creeper,  Starling, House Sparrow, Jackdaw, Redwing, Fieldfare, Jay, Magpie and Pied Wagtail 

I came across my garden list for Jan - Feb  in 1968-71. It had all these except Collared Dove and Stock Dove and also included Bullfinch, Marsh Tit, Turtle Dove, Corn Bunting, Yellow Hammer (still in Hedgerows), Tree Sparrow - all declined or absence with a change in the arable farming techniques.

Toft Birds

I took Phil's Olympus camera for a walk today as my Fuji is quite hard to manage with a very stiff painful forefinger. Quite a bit of territorial behaviour getting going among the birds yet the trees by the old railway had a flock of more than 150 Redwings still here before departing north. Although it was quite cold there were obviously large numbers of gnats in the air by the stream.

Feeding Strategies at Lackford Lakes

 Food is obviously at a premium over the winter months. Gadwalls appear to be a gentle non-aggressive duck but they spend their time with coots eating what they bring up from the bottom and occasionally steal food directly from the coots – a behaviour known as kleptoparasitism. At the feeding station, the robin attacked anything that came at all close to feeding area - the tits managed to get some seed by flitting in very fast while the larger sized blackbirds risked the aggression. The low light levels meant I was shooting between 2000 and 12800 ISO so not great quality.

Lackford Lakes - Woodland Birds

Unfortunately cloud levels had increased by the time that we visited the woodland feeding station at Lackford but the birds were as obliging as ever. My favourites were the Coal Tits and Marsh Tits though the Nuthatches always steal the show!!

Summer Leys Birds

A few birds from Summer Leys reserve including a family of Bullfinches, which was great as they are a bird so rarely seen now.