Big Garden Birdwatch - 2018

This year, I had to do my Big Garden Birdwatch a bit earlier (8:05 to 9:05 am) than usual because I needed to get to the hairdresser. I thought this might be why my scores were a bit low but I am assured that there were very few birds in the garden while I was away.

2018's Big Garden Birdwatch

I got a total of 18 individuals from 7 species:

• Blackbird - 4
• Blue tit - 3
• Carrion Crow - 1
• House Sparrow - 3
• Magpie - 1
• Robin - 1
• Starling - 4
• Woodpigeon - 1 

This compare's to last year's scores of 17 individuals from 11 species.  Mum suggested that the birds might still be finding plenty of food in nearby wild places and so are staying away from the garden.

The first birds to appear were the cheeky ones - a Magpie and a Robin, which both haunted the garden for much of the hour. I first saw the Robin amongst the purple cascade of Birch twigs. About 10 minutes in, they were joined by a group of Blackbirds, a Wood pigeon and a Crow, which lurked - rather shyly - in a branch just above the hedge.

I was a little concerned when Max, next door's cat showed up - but he just took a brief tour round the front garden before disappearing.  It was just after this, I started seeing the small garden birds including a lovely group of 3 Blue Tits in the Oak, their yellow chests almost glowing in the low sunshine.

I got slightly annoyed by 3 House Sparrows that seemed to be tormenting me by scuttling up and down the edge of a nearby house. Finally, they flew into our magnolia tree so I could count them.  That done, it was time to drop my note book and binoculars and head off to the town.

Big Garden Birdwatch - 2017

As I settled down for this year's RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch, I kicked myself for not doing it in yesterday's beautiful sunshine. At 9am the light was so murky that I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to see the birds, let alone identify them.

Then two cheeky Robins flitted into the trees at the front of our garden.  As I watched their boisterous progress through the branches, I noticed a Song Thrush sitting quietly in the Robinia.

Notes from my Birdwatch.

Looking out at the back I noticed a Goldfinch on the old teasel seedheads.  In the next quarter of an hour, several different types of birds appeared in the garden. Great tits, Blue Tits, Robins and Starlings were all attracted by the food I had put on the  bird tables. 



Woodpigeon feeding on tiny crab apples.

Perhaps the most bizarre sight was a Woodpigeon tying itself in knots while gathering up the last of the crab apples.  When it finished, it stared glumly at the empty branch.

At about 9:35 a Jackdraw, a first for my birdwatch list, perched briefly on a conifer. I found myself glaring at a Herring Gull that seemed to be glued to my neighbour's roof and couldn't be counted.  My hour was rounded off by the reappearance of the robins.

One of our pair of Robins.

The final score was 17 individuals from 11 different species. Strangely many of the birds that usually come as a flock appeared in ones, twos or threes.  I didn't positively identify House Sparrows but there was a group of birds that I couldn't see properly in the poor light and wasn't able to include in the count.

2017 Great Garden Bird Watch Results.

Compared to previous years, the variety of birds was good. It has only been better in 2011, the first year I did the birdwatch. However the number of individuals counted, at 17, was well below the average of 21.  Results of this and previous years' counts are shown below.

	2011	2012	2013	2014	2015	2016	2017
No of species	12	11	10	6	11	7	11
No of individuals	30	26	15	20	28	12	17
Blue tit	3	3	2	3	2	2	1
Blackbird	2	2	3	3	2	2	2
Collared Dove	2	1	1		1		1
Goldfinch			1		7		2
Great tit		1					1
Jackdaw							1
Magpie	2	2	2	2	1	1	2
Robin	1	1	1	2	3	1	2
Song Thrush	2		1		1		1
Starling	8	9	2	8	5	2	3
Woodpigeon	1		1	2	2	2	1
Chaffinch	2				2
Coal Tit		1
Carrion Crow						1
Dunnock	3	1
House Sparrow	3	4			1
Pied Wagtail	1	1	1
	Saturday, 29 Jan	Sunday, 29 Jan	Saturday, 26 Jan	Saturday, 25 Jan	Sunday, 25 Jan	Saturday, 30 Jan	Sunday 29 Jan
Start time	8.45 am	8.45 am	9.07am	8.50 am	8.45 am	8.55 am	9:05am
Weather	dull, icy		cold, bright	damp, misty	bright, cold	dull, mild	damp, mild

#30DaysWild Getting Grumpy about the Rain

This has been the most unrelentingly awful June I can remember. The sulky grey skies and incessant rain seem to mirror the attitude of a country in the grip of an incredibly ugly European referendum.  In the Wildlife Trusts' #30DaysWild Challenge people are making the best of it with a lot of jolly posts about children splashing around in puddles and talk of dancing in the rain. I feel like I'm the only one that's being grumpy about the weather. It's not just because it's spoiling my photos and fun. Homes are being flooded, crops damaged and wildlife harmed.  Early in the month our blue tits fledged just two youngsters - presumably down to the difficulty in collecting caterpillars.  Most days there has been relatively little visible insect life because of the difficulty that bees, butterflies etc. have foraging in this ghastly weather. 

Day 20 - Undercover Robin

First thing in the morning I found the deer poo that told me we have had an overnight visitor. The day's rain was unrelenting.

Look carefully and you can see a robin sheltering from the rain.

A robin hid from the rain under the bird-table roof. You can only just see it, but it totally nailed my attitude to all the rain and lousy light we've had this June. 

Day 21 - Glimpses of blue

Another day of dull wet weather

Bumblebee taking advantage of a short respite in the grim weather.

Busy bees took advantage of a brief burst of watery sunshine later in the afternoon.



7:20pm - Cirrus Clouds in a cobalt sky.

By 7pm I was desperate for something to photograph for #30DaysWild. The grey had cleared away so I took a photo of the sky.

9pm - Beautiful but slightly ominous.

After sundown it was lovely hearing the church bells and blackbirds singing while the light faded.

9:25pm - The grey creeping back on angels' wings.

As the sun dropped, the clouds greyed - a harbinger of things to come.

Lime Aid - Spring's at our feet

Once again it is time to trim the "epicormic growths" (suckers) from the feet of the trees in Lime Tree Avenue, which led to long-gone Uckfield House.  The year since I last did this seems to have rushed by. About half-a-dozen of us spent the morning working our way through nearly half the trees.  The group will be at work again next Saturday morning (Feb 27th - 9am until 1pm - more volunteers are always welcome).

The first of my 7 trees - before and after.

The day job has been pretty heavy since December and it was great to spend time working in the presence of trees that have lived so long and seen so much. While we were there it became more-and-more obvious that Spring was drawing life from the soil at our feet.

A cheeky robin found morsels where we had been working.

White-lipped snails and worms hiding amongst the growths at the base of a tree.

The wild plants round the trees are growing fast. I saw violets, primroses and alexanders already in flower as well as clumps of handsome wild arum leaves.

Wild arum leaves.

While I was working on the last of my trees, my every move was scrutinised by a curious goat, one of a pair kept by the school.

The school goat.

In case we were in the slightest doubt about the approach of spring - a frog appeared near one of the trees and was placed gently by the fence so it could find its way to the pond.

Frog and primroses.

After a few hours, I began to run out of steam and went home, scooping up some well-deserved fish and chips on the way.

Big Garden Birdwatch - 2016

Once again, I've been doing the RSPB's annual Big Garden Birdwatch. I stopped rushing round trying to get everything done and counted birds.

Some of my notes from this year's birdwatch.

It seems that every time I do a birdwatch, I see something new. This time it was a huge wood pigeon and a shy female blackbird sharing the tiny crab apples from one of our trees. The blackbird had been haunting the garden for some days and now we know that the crab apples were the attraction. I also enjoyed seeing two robins, who appeared twice:

• At 9:25 one robin flew to the base of the bird table, while the other sang in our conifer.
• At 9:53, one was searching round the base of the bird table, while the other perched in the cotoneaster nearby.

To be honest, I didn't see very many birds compared to previous years. The Guardian's article Mild winter means lower numbers for annual garden bird count, RSPB warns says ...

RSPB wildlife adviser, Ben Andrew, said: “If the UK experiences a continuation of these milder temperatures, those taking part in Big Garden Birdwatch may notice their gardens quieter than in other years. The milder weather means that there is more food available in the wider countryside, with birds being less reliant on garden feeders.”

After my hour was up, I had seen 12 individuals, which is the lowest in the years that I have been doing this. On the up side, one of the local crows actually landed rather than just flying over so I was able add crow to my list for the first time. 

Here are the results of this, and previous years' birdwatches:

	2011 Saturday, 29 Jan	2012 Sunday, 29 Jan	2013 Saturday, 26 Jan	2014 Saturday, 25 Jan	2015 Sunday, 25 Jan	2016 Saturday, 30 Jan
Start time	8.45 am	8.45 am	9.07am	8.50 am	8.45 am	8.55 am
Weather	dull, icy		cold, bright	damp, misty	bright, cold	dull, mild
Blue tit	3	3	2	3	2	2
Blackbird	2	2	3	3	2	2
Carrion Crow						1
Magpie	2	2	2	2	1	1
Robin	1	1	1	2	3	2
Starling	8	9	2	8	5	2
Woodpigeon	1		1	2	2	2
Chaffinch	2				2
Coal Tit		1
Collared Dove	2	1	1		1
Dunnock	3	1
Goldfinch			1		7
Great tit		1
House Sparrow	3	4			1
Pied Wagtail	1	1	1
Song Thrush	2		1		1
No of species	12	11	10	6	11	7
No of individuals	30	26	15	20	28	12

Big Garden Birdwatch - 2014

It's that time of year again. Time to do the RSPB's big garden birdwatch. Otherwise known as big migrations of birds to somewhere that is not my garden. The idea is to count the birds that land in the garden during a one hour period.

It was very damp and misty and, at first, I thought I wasn't going to get anything at all. I had heard some bird song when I left the house to fetch the paper but no sign of any birds landing in the garden.

While I was doing my birdwatch, I was amused by the starlings that perched just outside the garden. I wasn't so happy about the magpies that frightened the little birds off.

So here are my numbers for this and a few previous birdwatches.  This year, during a spell of record breaking wet weather, we had fewer species than previously but we had greater numbers of individuals thanks to our starlings boucing back from last year's poor showing.

	2011 Saturday, 29 Jan	2012 Sunday, 29 Jan	2013 Saturday, 26 Jan	2014 Saturday, 25 Jan
Start time	8.45 am	8.45 am	9.07am	8.50 am
Weather	dull, icy		cold, bright	damp, misty
House Sparrow	3	4
Blue tit	3	3	2	3
Starling	8	9	2	8
Blackbird	2	2	3	3
Woodpigeon	1		1	2
Great tit		1
Chaffinch	2
Robin	1	1	1	2
Collared Dove	2	1	1
Magpie	2	2	2	2
Pied Wagtail	1	1	1
Song Thrush	2		1
Dunnock	3	1
Coal Tit		1
Goldfinch			1
No of species	12	11	10	6
No of individuals	30	26	15	20

If you are reading this on the weekend I wrote it, you can still fit your hour in. Just spend an hour noting the birds that land in your garden or other patch of ground and submit your results using the RSPB website.