Any keen bird feeders out there?

Lorian

Fredula wrote: »

I live with my parents and my Mum won't let me feed the birds because it 'encourages' rats I bought my MIL a bird table for Christmas though - she loves feeding the birdies! She feeds them roast pork!

Some very minor precautions will avoid it happening. hang the food up high. feed low-waste food like sunflower hearts, and clear any waste off the floor before dusk - the sparrows and blackbirds will normally do this for you.



Don't give rats a route to climb to the food - if in doubt fit a guardsman plastic half-dome under the feeder, about £12 on ebay/amazon typically.

davenport151

Ken68 wrote: »

Not a Pelican then :-)

Possibly not! :rotfl:

Ken68

Lots of Seagulls now. The storms bring 'em inland.
And ducks and waders and soon, maybe one of these....

davenport151

Have invested in a larger bag of nyger seed to keep the goldfinches happy. According to the package this seed can also appeal to redpolls, siskin, greenfinch and coal tits so heres hoping.
long tailed tits are frequent at the moment are are blue tits.

Ken68

My young neighbour has just got back from Mid-Norfolk, she saw some of these.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/life/Common_Crossbill


Not sure of they are rare.

davenport151

I would say more elusive than rare but I think thats due to their speciality habitat (feel free to correct if i'm wrong).
Them and hawfinches are ones that remain a yet to be seen species for me.
Lovely day yeaterday in the front garden -laving paving slabs -spotted a pair of buzzards overhead.

cyclonebri1

davenport151 wrote: »

I would say more elusive than rare but I think thats due to their speciality habitat (feel free to correct if i'm wrong).
Them and hawfinches are ones that remain a yet to be seen species for me.
Lovely day yeaterday in the front garden -laving paving slabs -spotted a pair of buzzards overhead.

I find it remarkable how Buzzards have migrated south, 20 years ago you needed to be in cumbria or scotland to see them, they are actually approaching problem numbers down here in derbyshire right now. They are in conflict with gamekeepers, the age old issue that stupid pheasants are easy peasy for them.
I love them, always remind me of circleing vultures or condors over the andes:D:D

Meanwhile back in the garden, , for me this year has been the quietest I recall, they just haven't come to me.
I'm still sure there has been so much natural food available, not a flake of snow and only a handful of frosts (so far):o:o

I just have the usual pairs of birds that nest every year, woodies, doves, blackbirds and robins& bluetits, very few other visitors.

There is also the plague of magpies that I do my best to disturb whenever possible, before they get the message that there are nesting birds around.

davenport151

Cyclonebri1 - Thats certainly true. On a day like Monday was at this time of year till about may I can almost guarantee the sighting overhead of a pair of Buzzards -Vultures circling are exactly what they are like. The other success story has to be the Red kites. I even had one fly over not that long ago.

cyclonebri1

davenport151 wrote: »

Cyclonebri1 - Thats certainly true. On a day like Monday was at this time of year till about may I can almost guarantee the sighting overhead of a pair of Buzzards -Vultures circling are exactly what they are like. The other success story has to be the Red kites. I even had one fly over not that long ago.

We had 1 down here, I didn't see a pair. I spend a lot of time out in the country, I saw that many times over a few years, haven't seen it recently. It certainly got the twitchers out around here.

I did have the pleasure of seeing it from above, it swept down a steep track in front of me for several hundred yards almost hugging the road, never new they flew so low like that, great to see

andrewf75

cyclonebri1 wrote: »

I find it remarkable how Buzzards have migrated south, 20 years ago you needed to be in cumbria or scotland to see them, they are actually approaching problem numbers down here in derbyshire right now. They are in conflict with gamekeepers, the age old issue that stupid pheasants are easy peasy for them.
I love them, always remind me of circleing vultures or condors over the andes:D:D

Meanwhile back in the garden, , for me this year has been the quietest I recall, they just haven't come to me.
I'm still sure there has been so much natural food available, not a flake of snow and only a handful of frosts (so far):o:o

I just have the usual pairs of birds that nest every year, woodies, doves, blackbirds and robins& bluetits, very few other visitors.

There is also the plague of magpies that I do my best to disturb whenever possible, before they get the message that there are nesting birds around.

A few points:

They haven't spread south, they have spread west - they have always been very common in Wales and Devon/Cornwall as well as Cumbria and Scotland.

They are NOT reaching problem numbers at all. They are reaching natural numbers again now that we have stopped shooting them as much as we used to. Gamekeepers are the problem because they hate anything that might take one of their pheasants/grouse and these birds are of course non-native or intensively managed so these are actually the problem.

Here in Oxfordshire there are more large birds of prey than anywhere in the North or West now. Kites and buzzards are everywhere you look as we don't have grouse moors down here so no-one persecutes them. Its fantastic and even though 6 or more red kites circling over my garden is completely normal I never get bored of seeing them.