Hobbies and Crafts

I wish I had taken my camera with me this morning when I was out with the dog.Sitting on a garden fence between 2 houses were 2 Peacocks.Really quite close to the road.I think they must have come from Wicksteed Park.They looked quite at home lol

Hi Amanda, it is quite impressive when they go over in formation isn't it. Makes me think, we haven't seen the geese flying round here for a couple of weeks now. They seemed to go over southwards in the morning and north at night. They obviously had a couple of regular visits to make each day.

Next door has a small lake ,and for several years we used to have Canada Geese fly over the garden in the morning to land there,and late afternoon off they would go again.I don't know why they stopped coming.

Hello people .
I heard and saw a fantastic sight today . It was rather foggy here in Norfolk this morning and I suddenly heard the honking of many voices , getting closer . I rushed outside and peered skywards ( into the foggy sky ) and saw several skeins of Geese fly over...........all honking like mad things a each other .
A few hours later I was out down or high street , the fog had lifted by then and I again heard the honking ..........one large V shape whooshed overhead , going from the direction of the sea ,heading inland.
It was a joy to witness : ))

Not a lot happening bird wise at the moment although a couple of Magpies seem to be back!!!!!!!!!.

We have had the Green finches back feeding, also four starlings this morning so they are starting to return, also had the usual sparrows, a Dunnock, a Robin and a Blackbird so gradually they are returning.
Dizzie, sorry to hear about your son and pleased to hear he was OK.

Hello everyone. Not been on over the past week because my son fell off his scooter - he's OK but the bike still needs fixing - I needed to help him sort that out and help him get to and from work too. As we're rural he sometimes finishes after buses stop running. Also we went away for the weekend to see our daughter in Sheffield. We had a lovely walk in the Peaks in the rain, so of course didn't see much in the way of birds and wildlife as they'd all have been taking shelter.

Nevertheless, she lives in the city, but I was woken about 6am by the sound of owls which was lovely. On autumnwatch last week they were saying they wanted people to give them details of any tawny owls you hear so I'm going to look on the website to remind myself how to go about that.

Glad to hear the finches are returning to your area Jude. We don't seem to have any starlings here and they used to be so common. My aunt used to reckon there were so many of them that none of the other birds got a look in when you fed them, but I always thought they are quite colourful. Did you see the starling 2 weeks ago on autumnwatch. He was lovely and really stole the show. This week it was the tawny owl.

Me again:o)

Forgot to say our hopalong w/pigeon is back too, not seen him for some months, that was a lovely surprise, he's big and fat too :o)

Jane .... our squirrel pops in everynow and then, teases the dog and runs off again!! lol

jude:o)

Hi Jude,we don't seem to have a lot of birds ,although all the blackbirds came out after the rain the other day chomping up the worms.There is some bird I keep hearing in the tree,but I have no idea what it is.It has a very high pitched call.
I don't know where our squirrel is.It seems to have disappeared.We do have some very fat Wood Pidgeons .
It feels freezing out there tonight!!

Evening everyone:o))

Well, l was a good girl this afternoon and did some gardening:o))

Watching me very closely were a pair of robins and about 6 c/doves, as soon as l had finished and was about to shut the patio doors they were all their feeding:o)) l took a photo of the doves which l am trying to download from mobile to pc....no success as yet...grr
We now have 6 or more prs of chaffinches, all of a sudden they are back. Some weeks ago we read in the Forest of Dean papers that all the finches were dying of an awful slow death, not sure how wide an area this was, but at that time we had no finches....so we are so pleased so see them now, l'm going to contact Gwent Wildlife Trust to let them know.

Rain stopped me gardening, which is a shame as l was really enjoying it. l have some Sedum from a lovely lady on here to plant, but l have to sort everything else out first....hopefully more todo tomorrow:o))

Take care

jude :o)

Morning all:o)

Sun shining here and blue sky:o)

Atlast we have a pr of chaffinches, not seen them for ages:o)) lots of other small birds fltting about but have'nt had time to get the binocs out to see whats what.

Yes l had heard of the Beavers, not the ankle biters bit though...lol

jude:o)

We have had plenty of sparrows on the fat balls today plus a bluetit on the suet bits and a cheeky bluetit eating the apples on the tree.

Dizzie
Thank you for the link.
Jude I'm sure you would enjoy Rainbows.
Not a bird in site at the moment -even the Magpie has left.
Take care
Von

There's a younger section in Scouts too called Beavers for 6 - 8 year olds. Had you heard of them? Otherwise known as ankle biters! Strange creatures - but I've often found the most difficult Beavers grow up into the best Scouts and Explorers. It seems they do appreciate the extra effort put in over the years to turn them into decent human beings, do you find that Von, in the Guide sections?

Evening all:o))

Just been catching up with all of you.

Thanks for the info re Barrows, will look that up.

Ann....Never seen our wood pigeons on the feeders, ours are usually on the lawn and our low walls, Vic spreads the bird seed everywhere now, hence loads of strange things growing in the troughs + weeds!!


Tec....would love to see the Oystercatchers, apparently there are'nt as many now. Poor Yanto.....now why don't you take him out in the horrible weather?? Vic takes Madoc.....mad as he is....lol

Jane.....l have got the photo of woodie, did'nt put it on the blog as it was almost the same as the others.

Von/Dizzie....someone was asking me this evening if l wanted to help out with the Rainbows, l'd never heard of them till now.
It would be interesting to hear how many types of birds use the feeder:o)

Alice...we have'nt seen our LS woodie for ages now, we get so excited when we do though, like a pair of big kids.

Nite nite
jude:o)

We were looking out of the window this afternoon when we spotted a blackcap in the garden, we don't usually see them until it is cold so I guess that is our weather forecast.

After the heavy rain we had earlier the birds have been having a feast on the lawn.Big juicy worms being pulled up by the dozens lol.
Yesterday there was a buzzard flying quite low over the house,then there was the sound of Cawing and all the crows appeared to chase it off.
I think there was a lot of pheasant shooting going on at the weekend.Lots of guns going off.Is it time for that now?

Lol Tec. I have one of my cats sulking too. She sits by the window looking out with her shoulders hunched. Then she looks at me as if to say "I'm boooored". The other two just use the excuse to snuggle up on the beds for even more hours than usual. Had to frontline them this morning. Two easy, one nigh on a casualty visit. But succeeded with few lacerations this time. Now she really is glowering at me!

Von - you take me back a year. I was Akela to a cub pack where we used to live. I've been taking a bit of a break and keeping my head under the parapet locally now, but I still go back and help in my old group on special occasions, and OH is District Explorer Scout Commissioner for the old area - he can do that at a distance with a few visits to keep himself up to speed, so I support him with that a bit too. We went back for the district swimming gala a couple of weeks ago and a curry after with the old guard. I still have a loft full of useful resources which get gradually depleted as I take stuff with me for activities. I think I still have about 3 years worth of programme on the computer too. Do you know the Woodland Trust website? - Very good for tree recognition activities etc.

Hello Alice - we haven't seen our greater spotted woodpecker in a while. Used to be a daily visitor you could almost set your clock by last year. Hope he comes back.

Tec, just conjured up a funny picture of Ianto 'glaring' at you while looking out the window at the rain!!!

We had a Greater Spotted Woodpecker on the feeding post a few days ago - what a pleasure - followed by a Sparrowhawk after its obvious prey - but, they all have to live!

Alice