Spotted Flycatcher

I was up in Ripley, North Yorkshire at the weekend enjoying my son's wedding(!). In a quiet moment, I had a walk around the village where I spotted a pair of Spotted Flycatchers, who were busy "flycatching" in the church yard, and returning to an unseen nest. Both birds were very confiding, and posed beautifully on the various gravestones. A very nice "year tick".

Spotted Flycatcher

Whilst there, I also had a walk down to the nearby Ripley Castle and River Nidd, where I had another pair of Flycatchers collecting food, as well as Grey Wagtails feeding at least 2 juveniles, a fly over Grey Heron and several pairs of Jackdaws visiting nest holes. Other species recorded in the village including Pied Wagtail, House Sparrow, Starling, Blackbird, Song Thrush, Collared Dove, Woodpigeon, Goldfinch, Goldcrest, Red Kite, Swallow, nest building House Martin and Swift.

House Martin

Year List update:
174 - Spotted Flycatcher

Siskins and a Redpoll

I haven't been out ringing for a couple of weeks, so this morning's session at our private site in Wingerworth, Chesterfield was a nice chance to get back out again. We met up at 6.30am and ringed 44 birds of 12 species over the next 4 hours. As the title suggests, the highlights were the Siskins and a single Lesser Redpoll. We don't ring lots of these species, so when they're around, it's nice to catch a few. We've also had some good recoveries of Redpolls ringed at this site when they return to Scotland to breed. Hopefully, some of today's birds will turn up there later in the year.

Siskin

Today's totals were (new/retrap): Siskin 4/0, Lesser Redpoll 1/0, Goldfinch 14/0, Chaffinch 4/0, Bullfinch 3/0, Robin 0/1, Blue Tit 3/4, Great Tit 2/1, Long-tailed Tit 1/1, Robin 0/1, Wren 1/0 and Goldcrest 1/0.

Other birds seen and heard this morning were: Song Thrush (singing), Blackbird, Collared Dove, Woodpigeon, Great-spotted Woodpecker and Stock Dove (year tick). There were also at least half a dozen Common Frogs spawning in the pond.

Year List update:
110 - Stock Dove

Snowy Garden adds two new species

Last night brought a few hours of snow to the garden, the first proper snow of the winter so far, and meant that I woke up to this lovely, if somewhat grey, scene.

Snow!

As you can see in the picture I went out and cleared a spot around the feeders, filled up the water and put out a mixture of sunflower hearts, suet pellets and soaked raisins for the birds. In the next 3 hours I recorded 17 species of birds for the BTO's Garden Birdwatch Scheme, including 2 "year ticks"; Brambling and Blackcap.

The Bramblings consisted of 3 birds; 2 different males and a female bird. All 3 birds were feeding with a large number of Chaffinches (a minimum of 15 birds), and actually used the seed feeder, something I haven't seen before. I got a couple of photos.

Brambling (male)

Brambling (female)

The Blackcap was a male bird that flew into a Honeysuckle plant in the garden, pecked at a dried up berry, and then flew off again! Somehow I managed to get a photo in the minute it was present! 

Male Blackcap

This isn't the first record of this species in the garden in winter, but my last record was way back in December 2013 (see blog post here). They are a regular wintering bird in the UK now, and the BTO has just published some very interesting research about how garden feeding may have influenced this behaviour (see here).

The other species seen today in the garden were; Goldfinch (c.20), Greenfinch (2), Lesser Redpoll (1 male), House Sparrow (2; 1 male and 1 female), Magpie (2), Collared Dove (2), Woodpigeon (5), Starling (14), Robin (1), Blackbird (11; 6 males and 5 females), Blue Tit (1), Coal Tit (1), Dunnock (2) and Wren (1).

Year List update:
89 - Brambling
90 - Blackcap

Garden Lesser Redpoll

The number of birds coming to the feeders in my garden has started to increase again in the last few weeks. When I got home from work this afternoon I filled the sunflower hearts and five minutes later spotted this- a Lesser Redpoll!

Lesser Redpoll

This is my first garden record since February, so it'll be a good record for the BTO's Garden Birdwatch Scheme. Other birds seen recently in the garden are: Blackbird, Chaffinch, Goldfinch, Blue Tit, Coal Tit, Magpie, Dunnock, Starling, House Sparrow, Woodpigeon and Collared Dove.

Garden visitors

Whilst sitting having breakfast, and watching the birds for the BTO's Garden Birdwatch Scheme this morning,  I was lucky enough to spot this beauty. He flew in to the garden, hopped onto the feeders, fed for a few minutes and then disappeared.

Bullfinch

 

Other birds seen this morning were: Blue Tit (2), Great Tit (2), Coal Tit (2), Long-tailed Tit (2), Blackbird (8), Goldfinch (7), Chaffinch (9), Greenfinch (4), Lesser Redpoll (1), House Sparrow (2), Wren (1), Starling (4), Dunnock (2), Robin (2), Magpie (2), Sparrowhawk (1 male flew through), Woodpigeon (3), Collared Dove (2).

Big Garden Birdwatch

Every week I take part in the BTO's Garden Birdwatch Scheme, and record all the wildlife that uses our garden. This weekend, in addition to this, I've also completed the annual RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch.

The following birds were counted: Blackbird (9), Blue Tit (2), Coal Tit (1), Great Tit (1), Dunnock (2), Starling (9), Collared Dove (1), Woodpigeon (2), Robin (1), Goldfinch (8), Greenfinch (3), Chaffinch (9), Magpie (1), Carrion Crow (1) and Lesser Redpoll (3).

All but one of these species are present every week. The exception being the Lesser Redpolls which were my first record in the garden this year and therefore also  a "year tick". Here's a photo of one feeding with a couple of Goldfinches, just a few feet from the back window. I think this is a female bird, nicely showing its "redpoll".

Goldfinch and Lesser Redpoll

Here's  close up of the same bird.

Lesser Redpoll

Year List update:

61 - Lesser Redpoll

Garden birds in the snow.

We've had a bit of snow here over the last few days, so I've been watching the garden intently to see if we got any different visitors. Luckily today I spotted a Song Thrush and a Brambling, both very infrequent visitors to the garden.

Here are a couple of pictures.

Brambling

Song Thrush

 As well as these two species, I also had all the "usual suspects"; Chaffinch (15), Goldfinch (18), Greenfinch (4), Collared Dove (2), Woodpigeon (1), Magpie (2), Blue Tit (1), Blackbird (8), Dunnock (2) and House Sparrow (2).

Starling

Goldfinch and Greenfinch

 

As always, I'll be sending the records into the BTO's Garden Birdwatch Scheme.

Garden Mega!!

I don't blog that much about the birds in my garden, but today's an exception because I had a "mega" bird in - a Great-spotted Woodpecker!

Great-spotted Woodpecker



Looking back in my BTO Garden Birdwatch notes, the last time I recorded a woodpecker in the garden was in July 2001. Today's bird, as you can see from the picture, was feeding on fat pellets, which I only put out on Thursday, so hopefully, if I keep them topped up, it will return over the winter.

Other birds seen this afternoon, included this female Sparrowhawk, a male Sparrowhawk, that I didn't manage to get a photo of, 4 Greenfinch, 3 House Sparrow, a Robin, 2 Collared Doves, 3 Woodpigeons, 4 Blackbirds, 4 Starlings, 3 Blue Tit, 2 Great Tit 1 Coal Tit, and 15+ Goldfinch. A flock of approximately 30 Redwings were feeding on the Hawthorns behind the house. Hopefully, I can encourage a few into the garden over the winter. Bring on the snow!

 

Sparrowhawk (female)

Garden Birding - a few surprises

Every week I record the wildlife that uses the garden, as part of the BTO's Garden Birdwatch Scheme. The recording runs from Sunday to Saturday, so this morning's session was the first for this week.

It started well with over 20 Goldfinches present feeding on and around the sunflower feeders. 6 Chaffinches and 6 Greenfinches were also recorded along with 3 Blue Tits, 1 Great Tit, 1 Coal Tit, 1 Robin, 3 Dunnocks, 7 Blackbirds, 2 Starlings, 2 Woodpigeons and 6 Collared Doves (including a mating pair).

These species are recorded weekly in varying numbers, but today I recorded another 3 species that are a bit more unusual. The first was a Fieldfare, a species which is recorded once or twice a year in the garden, usually during heavy snow. Today's bird flew into the garden briefly, before flying to feed on the Hawthorn bushes behind the garden.

The second bird was a Lesser Redpoll. This species is more common and is usually present throughout the winter in small numbers. I had a couple last week, and today's bird was feeding along with the Goldfinch on the sunflower hearts.

The final new bird was a very big surprise, a male Blackcap! Over wintering Blackcaps have become an increasingly common sighting in Britain over the last 20 years, but this was my first record in the garden. It spent about 10 minutes feeding in the Mahonia bush. Hopefully, it'll stay around for a while. More information about Blackcaps can be found here.

Blackcap on Mahonia

Return of the snow!

Last weekend I was walking around Linacre hoping to see my first summer migrants. This weekend I'm sitting at home looking at a very snowy garden! Here's the view from my living room this afternoon.

Snowy garden

 

The blob in the top left hand corner is the pond that has/had 4 big masses of frogspawn in ealier this week.

Suffice to say I didn't get out ringing or birding today, but instead spent most of the day watching the feeders. In the end, I managed to see some interesting birds including "Mr White"(see here if you haven't read about this bird before), a couple of stunning breeding plumaged Lesser Redpoll, 20+ Goldfinches, 7 Siskins, 10 Blackbirds, 2 Robins, 3 Dunnocks, one each of Blue and Coal Tit, 3 Long-tailed Tits (feeding on the fat block), an enormous female Sparrowhawk, 3 House Sparrows, 3 Collared Doves and a couple of Woodpigeons. Not a bad haul, but I would have preferred to have been out at Linacre ringing my first Chiffchaffs of the year. Next week perhaps?

As always, the results will all be entered into the BTO's Garden Birdwatch Scheme.

Nestbox Update

The news from the nextboxes is somewhat mixed. First the good news. The Starlings are continuing to bring in grasses and a few feathers to the box on the side of my house and the nest is really beginning to take shape.

Starling nest

Now to the not so good news. On checking the Collared Dove nest at my mum's home yesterday I quickly noticed that it was empty and the adult bird had gone.

Empty Collared Dove nest

What happened to the nest is unclear.  I checked around the ground underneath the nest to see if the eggs had fallen, but there was no sign of them. Predation by a predator, possibly a Magpie, seems to me the most likely reason for this nest's failure.

I'll enter the information into the BTO's Nesbox Challenge website and hopefully the birds might try again later in the year. I'll keep you informed of any dvelopments.

Collared Dove and Starling nests update- 25th March 2012

Here's a photo of last week's Collared Dove nest that I took yesterday. It shows the nest complete with 2 lovely eggs.

Collared Dove nest

The Starlings have continued to bring materials in to the nestbox and the base of the nest is beginning to take form.

Starling nest

Remember, if you find a nest you can record it for the BTO's Nest Record Scheme or, if you have a nestbox in your garden, you can record any breeding activity for the BTO's Nestbox Challenge.

Collared Dove nest - 17th March 2012

After this morning's visit to Linacre I was lucky enough to find my third nest of the day! This time I found a Collared Dove, which had set up home on the bracket of a satellite dish at my mum's home. Birds have tried to breed here before without success, so it will be interesting to see how it gets on.

Collared Dove nest

The adult bird, most likely the female who carries out the incubation of the eggs in this species, was incubating. She flew off briefly when I went to see if I could get  a look in the nest, but returned very quickly as soon as I moved away. I think there was 1 egg, so fingers crossed it survives.

Bird Atlas Walk- 26th February 2011

As promised back in December, see here, I carried out the second winter visit for my Bird Atlas square this morning. Despite a few rain showers and a fall in the mud(!) I managed to see 27 species of birds including a great count of 23 Chaffinch, including many singing males. Other good news was the number of singing Song Thrushes, 20 in total, and a lovely flock of over 30 Redwing.

Chaffinch

New species seen this time were Stock Dove and Goldcrest. House Sparrows, Starlings, Collared Dove and Jackdaws were all singing and exploring potential nest holes.

House Sparrow

The most worrying record of this walk, however, was just 1 singing Wren. Possibly a result of the bad weather? Hopefully this will have changed  in time for the summer walk in April. I'll let you know.

Garden news - 23rd January 2011

One of the best things about birdwatching is that you can do it "anytime, anyplace, anywhere". The garden therefore, is always a great spot  for a bit of "birding therapy".

As I've mentioned before, I've been actively recording the birds in my garden as part of the BTO's Garden Birdwatch Scheme since 1999. As such it was that this morning I was watching the antics of the local Woodpigeons, Goldfinch, Greenfinch, Dunnocks, Robin (back down to single figures, now the cold weather has gone), Chaffinches, Collared Doves etc when I spotted an old friend, the white Blackbird first seen back in September and written about in this blog on 27th December. After a period of about 2 weeks with no sign of him, he's suddenly reappeared in the garden, as bossy and argumentative as ever!

This sighting, however, was totally overshadowed, when I looked up into the trees to see a gorgeous male BRAMBLING. This species is usually recorded once or twice a year in the garden, but more often than not in late March/early April when birds are presumably on the move back north. As such, this record is very early, but nevertheless, very pleasing and will find its way into both the Garden Birdwatch archives as well as the Bird Atlas. Note the white rump which can just be seen between the wings and the orange "shoulder", which help seperate it from the much more common Chaffinch. Just managed to grab a quick, pretty awful, photo before it disappeared.

                                               Male Brambling, just before he flew away!


As evidence that Spring is just around the corner, a pair of Magpies, are busy rebuilding last year's nest in the tree at the bottom of the garden. I know they're not everyone's favourite, but I say "live and let live".

Bird Atlas Walk- 29th December 2010

Another day, another entry!! Don't worry it won't last. As soon as I get back to work the birding will stop, or at least become alot less frequent, and the blogging will go the same way. So let's make the most of it while it lasts.

This morning was grey and misty, not exactly the greatest incentive to get out of bed, but as I'd volunteered to carry out 4 walks for the BTO's Bird Atlas, and the first had top be completed by the end of December, I thought I'd better get out and get it done. I'm so glad I did, because, as it came light the mist started to clear and although I wouldn't go as far as to say it was sunny, it was definately a very pleasant walk and a good way to pass 2 hours of the holiday.

This year's walk took place in a1km square located around Old Brampton, Chesterfield. I started off walking past Ashgate Hospice and got my first birds of the day, a small flock of 6 Redwing. These were soon joined on the list by 4 Fieldfare and the first singing bird, a Robin. As I left the main road bird numbers increased and I soon recorded my first Nuthatch, Great-spotted Woodpecker and Dunnock. Rooks and Jackdaws were numerous, both species prospecting for nest sites, the former in the tops of the mature trees by the bridle path and the latter around the many chimney pots on the houses. The walk continued over countryside, through several fields, including some that had only recently been spread with slurry- very smelly!! The smelly field were good for birds though with a group of 20 Black-headed Gulls and 3 Lapwings busy feeding on them. After a short time on Chatsworth Road which provided me with my first Collared Doves of the day, I walked back down Storrs Road and Old Road to rejoin the car. The last new bird of the walk was a gorgeous Jay, which flew out of the woodlands just in front of me. Lovely!!

As mentioned above, this walk was the first of 4 for this particular square. I will be doing another in February 2011 and then 2 during the breeding season to see which other species use this part of the countryside. The results will be added to the BTO website and will feed into the new Breeding and Wintering Atlas that covers the whole of Great Britain. If you fancy having a go at this type of bird survey work give the website a look. I can really recommend it.

Garden Birdwatching- 27th December 2010

With a break from school and more time at home due to the Chritsmas celebrations I've been concentrating my birdwatching efforts on the back garden this week. Because we feed the birds everyday, throughout the year, we usually get a good number of species and individual birds coming in. In fact, during the present cold conditions we've had much higher numbers of common birds than usual and a few nice surprises!!

Blackbird numbers have increased to 18 and they've recently been joined by both Redwing (4) and Fieldfare (6). The Robins have become less territorial and have even been seen tolerating each other, Starlings have returned to feast on the mealworms provided and Goldfinch numbers have increased to 20+. Blue, Great and Coal Tits rush in to grab a sunflower heart and Greenfinch and Chaffinch also take advantage of the food on offer. A Song Thrush has been seen on just one ocassion and Woodpigeon and Collared Dove visit everyday.

One particular bird that has been present in the garden since about September and which is very easy to recognise is a male Blackbird with a great deal of white feathers in his plumage. I mangaed to get a few shots of him recently, one of which is shown below. It will be interesting to see if he stays into the summer or whether he leaves in the spring. I'll keep you informed.

To make all this garden birdwatching even more fun I take part in the BTO's Garden Birdwatch Scheme, whereby I record all the birds using the garden each week and submit the records via their website. I've been doing this since 1999 and it's great to look back over the year's records and compare the results. Why not click on the above link and take part in 2011?