False Alarm

Ok, I'm wrong. It happens every now and then.

The Big Garden Birdwatch is NEXT weekend...

Don't know how I got it into my head that it was this weekend... but it's not. So you still have a week to stock up on birdseed. If you haven't already, start feeding them now so they get used to the idea that there's food available in your garden.

And next weekend I am going to haul my butt out of bed at 8am so I can get the best chance of seeing lots.

Great Garden Birdwatch Weekend

This is it. The weekend of the RSPB's Great Garden Birdwatch.

I only turned on the computer to print out the counting sheet, and to remind those of you in the UK to sit in a window with a cup of coffee (or tea, juice, water or gin if you prefer) and count the birds that visit your garden. All the instructions are here so please join in! Last year we saw a sparrowhawk make off with a sparrow in our very own garden! Such excitement! Who knows what we'll see this year... I am hoping our woodpecker will visit, and perhaps the bullfinches?

So off I go... to top up the feeders before I boil the kettle for my cup of hot.

Good News and Bad News

Look who came to visit me today! I am so excited! Gorgeous Mr Bullfinch, at last we meet!

He came the other day too, but I didn't manage to get a picture...

And if you're wondering, yes, I am very disappointed that the snow is almost all gone, there is no prospect of more, and all the Met Office can offer me is leaden skies and rain, which means mud until spring. I no longer crunch my way over to the bird feeders, I squelch and try to avoid huge puddles.

I don't care what anyone says...

... we just love the snow!

I know it causes travel trouble, but look outside! It's just so PRETTY!

I am tired of everyone moaning about being fed up with the snow. It's great! Yes, it's cold.

But guys... it's winter! It's supposed to be cold! Just think about all the bugs it's killing off with this freeze. I remember one winter recently when it was so warm that the caterpillars were still munching on my plants in January! Now THAT'S not right!

And this cold weather has been such a bonus for us garden-bird watchers. We've had loads in our garden eating all our food, and a lucky friend has even had bullfinches in hers!

This morning's feeding frenzy after I had refilled the feeders.
A chaffinch being its gorgeous self.

A group of shy-er ground feeders nibbling on crushed fatballs under the hebe bushes.
The bossiest and most charming of all our garden birds. Just look at how he's giving me the eye while I snap this shot! Cheeky!

Woohoooo.....

Hey, guess what? It actually snowed! A whole 2 inches or so... more in London and on the hills, I think, but here is where it counts.

So today, the last day of school, the boys went in wearing their wellies and have no doubt spent most of the day playing out in the snow - when they weren't in their classrooms playing games. What a way to end the term.

Spike has his nursery Christmas party this afternoon, complete with magician and a visit from You-Know-Who! He went in his wellies too.

This morning though we took a trip to Tesco to get more milk, and this was our mode of transport:

and we had some lovely visitors...

Feeding Frenzy

I filled up the sunflower feeder this morning (aka 'giving the birds their breakfast'). By lunch it was empty, so I went out a few minutes ago and refilled it, plus I topped up the peanuts and put two more fat-balls in that feeder too.

This so thrilled the birds that we had a veritable feeding frenzy on our hands! A huge flock of sparrows, FOUR goldfinches and a couple of greenfinches decended en-masse and the lot of them flapping around and jockeying for the best angle on each feeders. Amazing to watch.

Earlier we had been visited by our woodpecker, not once, but twice! He goes for the peanuts. And we had THREE collared doves moseying around on the grass below. I had only seen two before, so now I am wondering if this third might be a chick, all grown up now. Do collared doves mate for life?

I get such a lot of pleasure from these little guys. Worth every penny I spend on bird-food.

Snow on Snow!

It kind of flurried yesterday in a very haphazard and not very impressive way. In a very English snow sort of way.

But we woke up this morning to a good inch-and-a-half, which, although still not very impressive compared to, say the sort of snow they get out at the Big Green Barn, but still, for England, very impressive. Well, we were impressed.

The boys were dressed and out in it like a shot. (Note the abandonded wheelbarrow. Not been in much use recently. Oops.)

They are off at school now (hooray) and it has continued to snow lots. In fact when I opened the window to take this shot there was snow blowing in, like you would imagine on Little House on the Prairie.

It is very pretty out there, and we are having a nice warm day watching the snow, and watching the birds who are cold and hungry. We have even had dedicated groundfeeders like robins and blackbirds feeding off the fatballs in the tree. Now that means they are very hungry! Here are three very pretty goldfinches. I love their gaudy YELLOW feathers, and RED heads.

And here's my Rosemary covered in snow.

Big Garden Birdwatch Thrill

This weekend is the RSPB's Big Garden Birdwatch. It's 30 years old this year. The idea (for those of you who don't know) is that you take one hour out of the weekend and watch the birds - in your garden/park/at a bird centre/wherever there are birds. You count up how many of each species you see at one time (eg 2 sparrows, which fly away, and then 3 sparrows = 3 sparrows not 5) and then enter the information on the RSPB's website.

I did it last year with Pip, and when I printed out the counting sheet this year he recognised it and was very excited to do it again. So after lunch we went up to his room, which overlooks the back garden (he traded rooms with Spike, because Pip is getting to need his own space, and Spike was thrilled to get to move into the bigger room with all the toys, and to share a bunk-bed with Dude. And Dude got to move to the top bunk - so everyone felt like they had moved up a rung!).

Anyway, there we were, watching birds eating sunflower seeds, peanuts and fatballs hanging from the tree in the back garden... An hour is a fairly long time for a 7 yr old, but he did really well. He had the tally sheet, and we watched the birds' antics, tried to count the ever-moving flocks of sparrows and identify what we saw.

Spike came in to assist... I picked him up and took him to find his daddy since I couldn't possibly change his stinky bum - I was busy birdwatching! When suddenly there came a cry from Pip: Mum, what's THAT?! So I dumped Spike and came running... there was a big bird in our garden, one we had never seen before.

'It's really mean, Mum. It stomped on a bird!'

What??

'Yeah, there's a bird under it.'

What??

Sure enough there was a little bird's head moving under the big bird's feet.... I ran to get the camera, cursing that I hadn't thought to have it up there with us. I got it and aimed it at the bird, just getting into focus, when it took off. Aaargh!

We had our birdspotter's book with us, so quickly identified the 'mean bird' as a female sparrowhawk! Pip said it actually snatched a sparrow out of the tree before landing in the garden with it.

I was astounded. I had never seen a sparrowhawk before, let alone one catching a bird, and there he was, at age 7, seeing wonders of nature I had never seen in all my (many) years. Wow. I was so impressed with him, and he is now a confirmed birdwatcher. Hooray!!!

As we didn't get to take a picture of our sparrowhawk here is one courtesy of the RSPB. I hope they don't mind! We do pay our subscription fees...