Last updated at 16:18, Thursday, 04 March 2010

Gordon Nicholson reports on the birdlife in his Kells Garden

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Hello again, well it is starting to get very busy in the garden this month, we are getting a lot more birds coming into the garden now Spring is just around the corner. We have a lot of Blackbirds fighting each other at present, they do this every year, it’s getting nearer to them starting to pair up, so lots of fights break-out at this time of the year.

I have just started to notice that the Starlings have been coming back into the garden a lot more over the last couple of weeks, we had only been seeing a couple of them each day, but now we are getting 10 to 12 of them coming. The Starlings will be starting to build their nests shortly.

I really look forward to spring coming every year, for me it’s the best time of the year, it’s really great to see all the young birds coming into the garden with the adult birds, and to watch the adults feeding their young is really wonderful thing to see. I wish more people would make the effort to put a couple of bird feeders up in their gardens, I am sure they would get a lot of pleasure out of watching the birds coming into their gardens.

Also if you have any scraps of food please put it out in the garden, also any apples or pears or any other fruit at all that you are not going to eat please put that out. The adult birds need to eat a bit more in the breeding season to keep their energy up because they have to do a lot of flying back and forward to the nest feeding their young.

By the time I do the next article I might have some young birds to tell you about, I lot of the experts are saying that spring will be with us a couple of weeks sooner this year, but we will have to wait and see if they are right. Last spring I spotted my first bird collecting food for their young on the 10th April so it will be interesting to see if I notice any birds collecting food earlier this spring.

You should start to see all the birds flitting backwards and forwards in your garden as they gather nesting materials this month; the spring dawn chorus might even wake you. Also this month you should start putting up your nesting boxes for the birds, Boxes hung on walls are much safer from cats and other predators than those hung on trees. This is the time of the year to get your pruning done in the garden before the birds start to nest. Remove about a third from each of the shrubs you want to cut and you'll create a wide range of re-growth - and benefit more wildlife.

When putting out bird food in the spring and summer, it is best to avoid peanuts in your feeders unless you get a peanut feeder that the birds can’t take the full peanut out of, because there is a risk that the full peanut could be fed by adult birds to their young, and this could result in choking. Also if you buy any fat balls please put the fat balls in a proper fat ball feeder, please do not hang them up in the net covers they come in. The reason I am telling you not to put the fat balls up in the net cover is that if a small bird is happily feeding on the fat balls in the cover and a Sparrow Hawk or other predator comes along and frightens the bird it can get its leg tangled up in the net and it can easily rip it’s leg off.

Some birds do breed at other times of the year like the House Sparrow and the Rook, We have a Rook coming into the garden at the moment with a young Rook and the adult Rook is feeding it. The older birds have an advantage over the younger birds when it comes to breeding because they usually pair up and build their nest a couple of weeks before the younger birds do. A lot of the younger birds have just had to endure their first cold winter and they have to learn how to forage efficiently and learn what to eat and what not to eat, then they have to learn how to find a suitable roosting site. The older birds have a big advantage over the younger birds because they have done it all before.

Well we have a Blue Tit checking out our nesting box, but it keeps coming very late in the afternoon, so I can’t get a decent picture of it going into the box because of the lack of light at that time of the day. I really hope the Blue Tit stays and nests in the box this year because they have abandoned it the last two years.

I am pleased to say that I have not seen the Sparrow Hawk in the garden for a couple of weeks now, it must be doing it’s hunting over on the brows behind me. We had a couple of Wood Pigeons in the garden the other day, it’s the first time I have ever seen them in the garden, which seems very strange with all the trees we have on the brows.

We have a pair of Collared Doves visiting the garden at present; they are a very nervous bird because when they spot me at the door they fly away, so I am having a struggle to get a decent picture of them. They also seem to frighten the Blackbirds because every time one of the Doves appears all the Blackbirds fly-away, I think it must have something to do with the colour and silhouette of the Collared Dove when the Blackbirds see them coming they must think it’s the female Sparrow Hawk. The colour and the silhouette of the female Hawk and Collared Dove look very similar when they are airborne, so I think that must explain why the Blackbirds fly-away, well that’s what I think.

Well that’s all for this month, bye for now, Happy Bird watching,

Cheers Gordon.
 

First published at 13:38, Thursday, 04 March 2010
Published by http://www.whitehavennews.co.uk