Tuesday 29 April 2014

Birdwatch 2014

We didn't do the RSPB Birdwatch this January - just ran out of time. Also we haven't been putting out nuts and seeds on the bird table so don't see as many visiting close to the house. Again - lack of time and also getting very expensive. The wood pigeons (and squirrels) are really greedy and "hoover" up as many peanuts and seeds as you can put out and this doesn't really seem to qualify as helping the wild life. This year we haven't had a big freeze so the little birds haven't been under a lot if stress.

The RSPB have just published the results http://www.rspb.org.uk/birdwatch/   I extracted the results for Leicestershire ranked by number of birds recorded in gardens and parks throughout the county:

  1. House sparrow
  2. Blackbird
  3. Blue tit
  4. Woodpigeon
  5. Starling
  6. Goldfinch
  7. Great tit
  8. Robin
  9. Chaffinch
  10. Collared dove
  11. Dunnock
  12. Magpie
  13. Long tailed tit
  14. Greenfinch
  15. Jackdaw
  16. Feral pigeon
  17. Coal tit
  18. Carrion crow
  19. Wren
  20. Bullfinch

Surprised at the number of goldfinches and starlings spotted. We occasionally see a small flock of goldfinches but can't remember the last time we had a starling in the garden. 

Our January 2013 results were a bit different. Without doing a proper count I'd say, this year, our most frequent visitors are:

  1. Woodpigeon
  2. Blackbird (lots nesting now - but there weren't so many around in January)
  3. Robins
  4. Great tits (nesting in boxes under the summer house roof)
  5. Sparrows
  6. Blue tits
The numbers vary during the year. Obviously there's many species that migrate which wouldn't show up on a once-a-year study like the fieldfares and swallows. Chaffinches and other finches travel around a lot too. 

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