In complete contrast to the late evening, torch garden wander looking for moths last night, it was a very early start wildlife watching indoors this morning. My alarm was set for 4:15am and I managed to successfully complete the task I had set myself – to get up! Suspecting strongly that our Coal tit chicks… Read More #30DaysWild Day 12 – Nest box watch
It’s nearly time to say goodbye. Our seven Coal tit chicks have been home alone a few nights and that’s one sign. Looking at the time frame, the first chicks to hatch are 15 days old today (the rest 14 days). The suggested number of days to fledge is between 16-19 days so we are… Read More #30DaysWild Day 9 – Almost ready to fledge
Sunday morning bird counts, I have always enjoyed. Today was a good one in that it reflected the various stages of garden wildlife just now. The numbers aren’t particularly high and not all currently visiting species turned up either – but I didn’t expect them too. During a one hour bird count, 10:50-11:50, the species… Read More #30DaysWild Day 5 – Bird count & Nest footage
It’s fair to say last weekend was a busy one in and out of the garden for both myself and wildlife. Not on the radar, at all, was the very busy Coal tit speedily nest building in my camera nest box on Sunday! To say I’m absolutely thrilled is an understatement. What a delightful little… Read More A great weekend of walks and wildlife
A warm welcome please for our acrobatic cast members… The Blue Tit Parus caeruleus The Great Tit Parus major The Coal Tit Parus ater This post was published by Shirley for shirls gardenwatch in December 2013.
Were chicks being fed in my garden this morning? At just 20 seconds between repeated visits to a ground feeder one bird actually had me considering this! Well, very briefly anyway. So what bird had me transfixed by its speed and efficiency in finding food… the Starling perhaps? Nope… The Coal tit Parus ater shown… Read More Wednesday weird
Frosted images are gathering momentum around garden blogs at the moment. Yep… I would like to add some from my garden too. Over the weekend we saw pretty cold temperatures for this time of year. At -5.5 deg C (22.1 deg F) throughout the day it was too cold for snow but for two days… Read More Frozen out
Let’s start with the plants. Well, as you can see below they have a small covering of snow. It had been forecasted to fall overnight but it was still a surprise to open blinds this morning and see it covering the garden. I love to see the look of this sort of amount – not… Read More Updates galore
No… I’m not talking about the ‘award-winning American pop group that enjoyed success in the late 1980s and early 1990s as a boy band’. It has been a long time coming, but I’m back to talking once again about the birds that visit my garden. The truth is that with the lush foliage plants in… Read More New kids on the block
Thanks to garden bloggers in America I am discovering new birds that visit gardens there and how similar some are to our European birds. I have to say I have found this very interesting. The Carolina Chickadee was brought to my attention after I published a post with photos of our Coal Tit taken in… Read More The Coal Tit and Chickadee