Hobbies and Crafts

Lots of the usual birds around, sparrows, blackbirds, pigeons and collared doves, and some starlings, plus a robin that comes for his mealworms and a thrush. I haven’t seen the goldfinches come for a drink for a long while now. I gave the bird bath another good scrub out yesterday and it’s nice and clean again now so perhaps that will attract them.

The garden is full of bees of all sorts I haven’t seen a lot of butterflies but there was a painted lady around yesterday. The buddleias are coming into bloom and that usually attracts some butterflies. Every time I look in our tiny pond there is just one little frog’s nose poking out of the water so it looks like he is billy-no-mates this year ;-)

We don't seem to have a frog this year.

We had a robin that spent several weeks flying down the side of the house to a scrappy nest but he then suddenly stopped and I don't thin there were any eggs/babies. then we had a blackbirds nest and a female blackbird flying to and from the nest with bugs etc then yesterday she has disappeared and the nest is empty so we don't know if she produced anything or if the bird had fledged. Strange that is two of them.

Not getting many birds feeding but that is to be expected given that we have had three holidays. the occasional goldfinch and bluetit and a hoard of starlings if they spot the mealy worms.

We do have a lot of bees although not many bumble bees. and, so far only one little butterfly a small dark brown one, don't know what it is.

I haven't posted in a while but always read the thread :-D

Our lawn which is mostly moss and wild flowers grew quite a lot whilst away on holiday recently. When we returned OH mowed said lawn but left a circle of wild flowers.
Looking out of the window one day I noticed a little family of goldfinches ( parents and babies )all descended on the patch of wildflowers and stayed for a while feeding on the grasses.
A delightful sight :-D :-D :-D
One of the babies has now managed to feed from the feeder but the other one is still very nervous and is still fed by parents ;-)
We also have a family of dunnocks who are just beginning to move away from the nest.
I haven't seen any frogs either Ann but the water level in our small pond is very low at present.

Von, how lovely to see the goldfinches in the wild flowers. I planted a packet of wild flower seeds plus cornflowers and they are all growing and flowering, not seen any birds in there though. We do have a really tiny robin following us round the garden but can't make out if it is a small adult or one of this years babies.

I am puzzled and hope someone can come up with an answer. What is tipping all the seeds from the feeder on to the ground underneath while leaving the feeder hanging completely intact on the tree?

I have had pigeons swing on the feeder till they manage to unscrew it so that the bottom falls off and all the seeds fall out and just in case it was them I changed the heavy metal feeder for a very lightweight plastic one that would be unlikely to take their weight as it only has two tiny plastic perches. Same thing happened. The feeder remains intact with the tube screwed firmly into the base and the lid but all the seeds from inside the tube are on the ground underneath :-S :-S

I have now temporarily stopped putting seeds out. I'll see if whatever is doing it turns their attention to the other hanging things - fat balls, peanuts and niger seeds.

Anyone else had this happen?

It sounds like a squirrel Vera do you have any in the area? Very strange but doesn't sound like a bird. Could it be a cat after a bird?

Our robin appears to have succeeded at last in producing a chick. I think they had three goes and we never saw any eggs or chicks but this time there is a little open beak peeping over the top of the nest, I dare not take a photo as they are very young parents and very nervous of their offspring so we are staying away from the nest which has been the same one since early May.

we have also had two young male and one young female blackbirds feeding on the mealy worms. They must be fro a very early brood this year as they are quite big but obviously still juvenile.
We have also had three goldfinches feeding this morning.

Our baby goldfinches have now learned to feed from the feeder by themselves :-D :-D :-D

Lovely that your robins have a chick Ann. It must be good seeing the little goldfinches feeding as well Von.

On our feeder today was a family of bluetits. At least I think it was a family. There is often one on there and sometimes two together but today there were five. Three of them looked like youngsters. I would have liked a closer look but knew they would fly away if I opened the door to see them better.

There has been no sign of either adult or baby robins for a couple of days now.

Little and big robins have not been seen for two days. I am assume little one has learned to fly and is somewhere out of our garden. Hope it is ok but not a lot we can do now.

No goldfinches around while we were here but they are very fickle, they have probably found food elsewhere. Actually not a lot of birds around at all today.

Just seen our tiny baby robin but it hopped through our back gate and into next doors back garden so we can't keep an eye out for it now. It still can't fly and is like a little round puff ball.

At least you have seen it Ann, and know it is fine. I wonder how long it will be before it flies.
I am missing my little birds on the window feeder since we took it down.But I am sure they are getting plenty of food elsewhere.Iam sure I will put it back up again at some point :-D :-D

I had not remembered that you had taken it down Jane. Yes we know it is still ok in next door although can't see it in there. Not sure how long it takes before they fly. We still have a young and very scruffy male blackbird who can't fly very well. He comes to eat the mealy worms. I think he must be from an early brood this year and maybe has not got all his 'flying' feathers.

Don't forget the birds in the hot weather they need water to drink and bathe in.

A friend of mine used to get an old bin lid out of her shed in dry weather and make a temporary pond for her garden birds.

You are right about the water Pat. We have a tiny “pond” and a bird bath and I check the water levels every day as they do evaporate in this heat. The birds don’t use the pond much, they seem to leave that for the frogs, but the bird bath is in constant use. This morning there were 7 or 8 starlings all fighting to get in the bird bath at the same time.

Our water feature pond is where both the blackbirds and the robin have their daily baths and the sparrows shower in the cascade. We also have two birds baths and a fountain type water feature which the birds love.

Over the past three days we have had five very young red admiral butterflies in our conservatory. We can only assume they have been hatching out in there. How lovely. They happily flew out when we opened the door.

I had a Red Admiral in the lounge Ann today. I managed to get it out again safely.In the last week I have had 3 Butterflies that have found their way in through the open patio door. All safe in the end :-D I worry so much about damaging the wings when trying ot get them out .
Just found a deheaded bird . It could have been a LTT :-( I think Mr Thomas might have had something to do with the Murder :-| :-|

I've been looking in on this forum for a week or two (or five!!) and have taken the plunge to join just for a month to see how it goes! I am very interested in wild life, and where we live has so much all of which I would love to share!
At the moment we have a family of woodpeckers, bluetits, swallows on their second brood, a sweet baby robin + mum/dad?! (only appears to be one though!) wagtails! Also jennywren is busy collecting spiders off the fence and more beside! I also saw a Red Admiral yesterday on the Buddleia.