On looking out of the window.

By © Francis C. Franklin /Attribution: © Francis C. Franklin / CC-BY-SA-3.0

We were taking a break from work at the Glebe garden, indoors because the weather was unseasonably cold. My friend looked out to see two blue tits on the bird feeder. Suddenly there was a flurry of activity between the feeder and the nearby elder, now in full leaf and bloom. There was a family of blue tits! Were they from the nesting box in our garden, or maybe from Peter’s box on the balcony across the river?

No chance of any sort of a photo from that distance, but here is a glorious image from Francis C. Franklin, via Wikipedia. Let’s hope the fledglings soon learn about the predatory cat that has begun to frequent the garden. Maybe the cold morning kept it indoors, or the noise of power tools and hammers from next door.

Thanks to my sharp-eyed friend for a special moment!

Des Res for Wrens?

We were given a wren house for Christmas, I placed it in our riverside hedge at the Glebe garden where I work with disabled gardeners in non-pandemic times. Needless to say, the wrens nested under the opposite hedge, in the heap of scrap timber I was going to tidy away – I’m glad they were spotted in time!

The parent wrens were quite happy to fly very close to my workmate when he was sawing away, almost on their flight path.

On the other hand, we had at home a similar box for bluetits, hung on our house wall and surrounded by pyracantha, a thorny evergreen. Two years running, and again after a year’s break, the blackbirds built on top of it. After that we did have blue tits (like chickadees) two years running. I think they prefer old wood to the smell of new.

The wrens’ house is hidden in the hedge opposite.

the blue birds were back

From the bluetits’ perspective, an apricot tree full of aphids is a great blessing. That’s the virtuous reason why this human does not spray it with insecticide, but he also has a care for Mrs T’s tadpoles, which are now quadrupeds. And the tree could not be sprayed properly without a flying drone; it’s in a really awkward position.

That’s the lazy reason for not spraying.

The foliage means that unless you know where and when to look, you won’t see juvenile blackbirds or robins, sitting tight till parents come. You will hear and then see bluetit babies, since they travel around with the rest of the family, chattering away between beakfuls of greenfly.

Mrs T witnessed the return of our family of bluetits at coffee time yesterday, and went on her way rejoicing.

Looking for a Blue Bird

Spring into summer, there’s no stopping it!

On Friday morning I sat outside to eat breakfast under the apricot tree which was full of the contact calls of bluetits. Our nestlings had flown, and Mrs Turnstone was too late to witness their taking off up the hill. Neither sight nor sound of them.

Later that day the robins from next door’s yew were in evidence, and we observed a change in behaviour from the blackbird cock, this time flying away and allowing two magpies to chase him. I’d guess his chicks were now fledged and not needing any sort of attention from murderous magpies. Young blackbirds are excellent at sitting still when first they leave the nest; this is one of a previous generation who did well at pretending not to exist.

With due respect to the bluetits and even the row between the blackbird and magpies, the noisiest have been the starlings, who seem to have co-ordinated leaving their nests to form chattering gangs, showing the children all the best places to feed and shelter. Wherever I went, Abbot’s Hill: starlings; the playing field: starlings; the river bank: the reeds full of starlings; even Mrs O’s garden: starlings. Hyperactive parents with hyperactive children!

But also in Mrs O’s garden – and heard by Mrs T: a family group of bluetits; I trust they are ours! the added bonus, a family of goldfinches. That pleased Mrs Turnstone.

Read about new life in a Yorkshire garden here: https://thebigbuzz.wordpress.com/author/thebigbuzz/