Collard Dove | HLB Photography

An early start for work on May 6^th meant I heard my first Cuckoo! I drive past my patch to get to work and often stop for a few minutes if I have time. I have now heard the Cuckoo a few times and it appears to have got closer but I’m not convinced its actually in my patch yet!

I have concentrated more on the residential (my friends house and garden) part of my patch this month, the crop has now got quite tall and I am unable to walk amongst it.

May 9th I spotted a Collard Dove that looked a little odd, on closer inspection I discovered that it has a broken beak. It seemed to be feeding but took longer to pick up food than the other birds. I’ll be be keeping an eye on it to see how it does as I’m not sure there is anything I can do for it.

On May 10^th I wanted to get some images of the Starlings taking food into the roof space. They were visiting fairly frequently and also removing faecal sacs. Then their behaviour changed, at first I wondered if it was my presence but I had stood and watched them before with no effect. One of the adults was taking food to the nest entrance, calling and then flying to the top of the roof calling again, this pattern continued for the next 20mins I continued to watch. Once it was getting dark I left but apparently the calling continued, I believe they were trying to call their young out of the nest.

May 15^th I believed the Starlings to have fledged, although I hadn’t seen any! The adults seemed to be collecting nesting material again so I am guessing they are aiming for a second brood 🙂

I have also now noticed that there’s a Blue Tit nest under one of the tiles of the porch. The parents perch on the telephone wire before darting in to feed the chicks 🙂 While watching the Blue Tits I heard a lot of bees. Looking up I noticed a slightly broken fascia board and realised the bees were going inside – Tree bumblebee’s. I did mention it to my friend, he doesn’t mind bees so is letting them stay as long as they don’t cause any trouble!

The end of May and the Starlings have definitely fledged – 14 in total!

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Every year the first date that goes in my diary is the RSPB’s Big Garden Birdwatch. I always notice the birds in the garden, whether its the Woodpigeon’s squabbling over the grain, the Blackbirds digging around in the flower borders or the small charm of Goldfinches that are on the feeders. But once a year I stop for a whole hour and really pay attention, counting them all.

I perch myself on the kitchen counter to make sure I can see as much of the garden as possible and get as comfortable as I can! This year I felt more prepared. I invested in some binoculars last year which made identification quicker; its easy enough to complete the count without binoculars but there are loads of shrubs in the garden and the smaller birds hide in them, so with the aid of binoculars this time I could figure out who didn’t want to be counted 😉 In the past I have used a 500mm lens on my camera which gets a little heavy when holding it for an hour! This year I just used it to take some photos 🙂

I like to keep a table of what I have seen including previous years data for my own interest.

	2017	2016	2015
Coal Tit	1	2	1
Blue Tit	2	2	3
Great tit	1		1
Long-tailed Tit			1
Blackbird	7	4	2
Woodpigeon	4	2
Goldfinch	7	9	2
Blackcap	1	1
Greenfinch		1
Robin	1	2	2
Collard Dove	2	3	1
Starling	3	1	1
House Sparrow	3	1
Dunnock	1		1
Pied Wagtail			1
Siskin	2
Total no. of species	13	11	11

I had a surprise visitor today; the Siskin. I have seen them in the garden before but only on one occasion, I was just lucky they turned up during my count 🙂 15 mins after I had finished counting I spotted a Greenfinch on the feeder! There have been Long-tailed Tits in the last few days but sadly none turned up today. I’m so glad the Sparrowhawk didn’t turn up or it would have really altered my count! When it shows it can be seen sitting on the fence waiting for the Goldfinches, we found a pile of feathers a few weeks ago!

The RSPB also ask what other animals you see in the garden throughout the year, we have: Hedgehog, Fox and Slow-worm.

Below are a few record shots of some of the birds I counted…

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