Sunday 13 July 2014

A BUMPER BREEDING SEASON?

Plenty of butterflies and moths have been in and around the garden recently, which makes me think it’s been a good year for them.

The most ‘popular’ attendees to the garden are the orange tip butterfly and the cinnabar moth, both of whom have been seen daily in the garden.

I’m beginning to think this has been a significant boom year for our small garden birds. I’ve now seen two lots of blue tit fledglings, the latest this week and the robins are looking distinctly scruffy, which makes me think they’re on to their third brood.

The blackbirds have had at least two, the swallows second brood also fledged this week and there appears to be large numbers of magpies and goldfinches.

But the big news on the nesting front is that both the house sparrows and tree sparrows are busy raising a third brood in the garden nest boxes.

The parents seem to be having a competition with each other as to who can raise the most chicks, as invariably when I can hear chicks in one nest the other follows with a day or so.

I’m not sure how many have fledged from each nest since April, but it must be double figures.

I very much doubt there’ll be a fourth fledging, but with the hedgerows around the garden swaying under the weight of sparrows, I wouldn’t be surprised.

What it must mean is it’ll also be a bumper year for the birds of prey. I know there’s a few sparrowhawk around here and certainly kestrels. The crows, magpies and jays may also pick of a few weaker young too, plus the resident little and tawny owls might pinch a couple from night roosts.

In the next couple of weeks I’ll be showcasing the transformation of the garden, showing images taken at weekly intervals from March this year.

The transformation is stunning, well I think so.

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