BIRDWATCH 2013 BRING SURPRISE VISITOR

After the wildlife in and around my garden spent the last few weeks dealing with the cold, frosty and often snowy weather, this weekend brought a whole new set of meteorological setting for them.

The snow melt and heavy rain has led to lots of flooding, but also an opportunity as temperatures rise and a host of flying insects took to the air.

Looking at the week ahead would suggest that the weather will be windy and fairly wet, offering not much comfort for those insects. The good news is those insects are about and hiding when the weather is cold.

I carried out the RSPB’s 2013 Birdwatch survey this weekend and it was good to see plenty of the birds I usually see coming along for me to officially count.

Three types of tits – great, blue and long-tailed – along with jays, blackbirds, wrens, tree and house sparrows, dunnocks, chaffinches, robins and a lovely surprise in a female bullfinch.

This survey is important and I had help from my young daughter who was very excited seeing the robins and blackbirds.

The blackbirds are a couple and she now calls them Mr and Mrs, well after I’d tried to tell her the colouring differences between male and female. Perhaps I’ll leave that again for another day!

Watching the female bullfinch was a nice surprise and while I’ve seen bullfinches before in my garden, their visits are rare.

One sight that is rare in the summer and not much more common in the other seasons is the long tailed tit.

In winter I often see a flock of them hanging from all sorts of angles in the trees, chattering to each other before one, and then the rest descend on my feeders – mainly the peanut ones.

The flock numbers about ten and during the last few days they’ve been seen every day.

So will the change in weather bring any more exciting visitors, or perhaps more indications that thoughts of the birds and other wildlife are turning to the breeding season.

I’m now going to try and fix the nestbox camera and see which if the tits will be first to claim it for their own this year.

WEATHER WARNING OR JUST WEATHER?

So the first snow of the winter arrived tonight as I arrived home from work. Only about a couple of millimetres, but at least something that should show the animals that will walk around the garden and surrounding areas at night.

I took my torch and filled a couple of the bird feeders to ensure some food for the small birds when they wake up in the morning. I’m unlikely to see them enjoying it as I’ll be away before first light and home after dark.

At least the weekend is here and Saturday should tell me how much the food was appreciated.

I’m expecting the feeders to have been more or less emptied, although that does depend entirely on how much snow does arrive.

The forecast suggested we’d get a fairly large amount, although I get the feeling it won’t be too much, certainly not enough to stop me being away all day.

Having snow in the garden is a great way of seeing the pattern of footprints, working our who they belong to and try to work out which order they went in to find out how each animal goes about its food search.

I sometimes use this knowledge to place food, or help cultivate an area. One of the key things I did in the autumn was fill the borders with dead leaves and cut grass to provide a layer of protection to the soil, a habitat to those small animals that live in and around the leaf litter and soil, a food source for birds and small mammals that eat those small creatures and fertiliser for the soil when spring comes around.

It has worked in previous years and I can tell be the fact the leaves are scattered around that the birds are finding food in there. The only thing I’d like to see is the birds, particularly the blackbirds, putting the leaves etc back!

So what will tonight bring? I hope snow and a few inches, but thing this is something others will enjoy and I will have to gaze at the news images and video and wonder what it would be like.

WINTER WEATHER WINGING OUR WAY

The warm start to 2013 has been abruptly halted as we experience some cold weather, with the promise of some snow on Monday.

I’m still sceptical that the snow will reach my garden, but I’m hoping it does. It’s not great for the plants and animals, but it’s an important part of the nature for British wildlife.

Most of the birds, mammals and insects will be happy once the results of the winter weather give them a good chance of a positive breeding season.

In 2013 my garden has twice been visited by a passing group of long tailed tits, but as the weather wasn’t too cold they moved on fairly quickly.

I expect to see more of them in the next week or so. Today a small group of chaffinches visited the garden, making up a bigger flock of visitors with the tree and house sparrows.

There has been a splendid looking robin in the garden, which I’m presuming is a male as he’s looking dominant and very brightly coloured. If an artist had painted on his red breast it wouldn’t be better than how this robin is currently ‘dressed’.

The blue tits and great tits are still around and I’m hoping to have my nest box camera working to see if any are roosting in there.

As I have four nest boxes around the garden, I hope that the small birds use them to escape the winter cold.

Two years ago I noticed a great tit roosting in there in January and February, giving it control over nesting rights. I’ve stocked up all my feeders and will check them every other day while the cold snap continues as I’m expecting them to be ‘popular’.

So bring on the snow and frosty nights, and I can see which animals are leaving footprints in my garden and the surrounding lanes.