Show us ya birds !

[openspaceman]

18 minutes ago, Paul in the woods said:

Whilst I agree with that I think the decline of greenfinches is down to people not keeping their bird feeders and water clean and spreading Trichomonosis about.

 

https://www.bto.org/our-science/projects/gbw/gardens-wildlife/garden-birds/disease/trichomonosis

 

Right I'll clean out the feeders but I haven't seen anything other than tits robins, doves and goldfinches this year, I knew loss of house sparrows was due to disease but put loss of finches down to more secure grain stores and loss of over wintered stubble as farmers went straight into winter wheat after harvest.

 

Not to mention rooks, magpies and starlings

[sime42]

Grey wagtail from last summer feeding on a damselfly and goldfinch from the other morning. [emoji106]1:

I love seeing Goldfinches, one of my favourites. Though I think they should be called Red Finches instead. Used to get them often in my old house garden, but I very rarely see them now since we moved.
Don't think I've ever seen a Greenfinch.
We get lots of tits, robins and black birds and occasionally long tailed, great and coal tits.
Plus too many bloody pigeons, maggies and jays.

[sime42]

Anyone have any idea who this belonged to?

I found it on top of one of our wood piles, just under the corrugated plastic roof. It's beautifully constructed. I guess robin or blackbird.

Do blackbirds re-use their nests, does anyone know? This was perfectly intact so I placed it back on top of a log stack adjacent to where I found it last year.

[AJStrees]

Whilst I agree with that I think the decline of greenfinches is down to people not keeping their bird feeders and water clean and spreading Trichomonosis about.
 
https://www.bto.org/our-science/projects/gbw/gardens-wildlife/garden-birds/disease/trichomonosis
 

Yes that’s probably right, but behind that is the problem of not enough food in nature for birds to eat in the first place because England is pretty much an ecological desert.

Having stripped out most of the woodlands and meadows we now find ourselves in a bio diversity crisis. Not to get political about it. Just saying. [emoji106]

[Treerover]

I love seeing Goldfinches, one of my favourites. Though I think they should be called Red Finches instead. Used to get them often in my old house garden, but I very rarely see them now since we moved.
Don't think I've ever seen a Greenfinch.
We get lots of tits, robins and black birds and occasionally long tailed, great and coal tits.
Plus too many bloody pigeons, maggies and jays.

Are you feeding Niger and sunflower seeds ?
I stopped feeding the birds for possibly 8 months as I didn’t want a concentration of wild birds over our grazing ducks and chickens in the garden.
Within 1 week there is a constant stream of Goldfinches and Greenfinch’s that have very quickly found the feeders again .
But notably the magpies and jays aren’t about .

[gary112]

These poor little buggers were struggling to hold on yesterday 

[nepia]

But they managed! It was comical watching the Great and Blue Tits hold on to near horizontal feeders but nothing was going to stop them getting their daily dose of sunflower heart

[Macpherson]

On 08/02/2022 at 20:31, Paul in the woods said:

Whilst I agree with that I think the decline of greenfinches is down to people not keeping their bird feeders and water clean and spreading Trichomonosis about.

 

https://www.bto.org/our-science/projects/gbw/gardens-wildlife/garden-birds/disease/trichomonosis

 

 

Interesting as I too have lost the very few Greenfinches that I had in recent years, I try to keep my bird table clean but I've got a few neighbours who definitely don't... I'll need to look out for the symptoms, cheers.

[sime42]

Are you feeding Niger and sunflower seeds ?

I stopped feeding the birds for possibly 8 months as I didn’t want a concentration of wild birds over our grazing ducks and chickens in the garden.

Within 1 week there is a constant stream of Goldfinches and Greenfinch’s that have very quickly found the feeders again .

But notably the magpies and jays aren’t about .

 

Cheers. I used to have Niger seeds out all the time, but gave up when I was getting no takers. Thinking about it, maybe that was a problem; they were getting too stale. I'll give the feeder a good clean and try again with some new seeds.

 

I normally have a mixed feed, sunflower hearts being one of the ingredients.

 

[Treerover]

 

Cheers. I used to have Niger seeds out all the time, but gave up when I was getting no takers. Thinking about it, maybe that was a problem; they were getting too stale. I'll give the feeder a good clean and try again with some new seeds.

 

I normally have a mixed feed, sunflower hearts being one of the ingredients.

 

Ah now I’ve had this with both peanuts and Niger seed before.

Just a riffy batch and the birds wouldn’t touch them although to me they looked fine.

Threw the whole lot away and bought fresh and they were back within days