Whilst the good weather meant that I had to refill the small water tray after the song thrush had been for a bath, elsewhere there were great comings and goings all along the wall of the rosebed today. The wren worked conscientiously through the stones, busily disappearing into the little tunnels and dark cracks. It… Continue reading Oops…
Author: baebell
More-or-less retired academic in the lively arts.
Hither and yon…
Today there were a series of moments, familiar and curious. There was a blackbird performing an extensive grooming session in the freshly turned earth and ash around the base of the currant bushes. It would scratch around its ear canal, on its offside, then flare its wings and pose for a while in a shaft… Continue reading Hither and yon…
Access all areas…
The woodpecker generally only goes for the peanut feeders. I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of times it has come to the feeder under the roof of the birdtable close to the house, trying to wedge its head underneath the canopy. Nevertheless, this afternoon I saw it with its beak… Continue reading Access all areas…
Playing games…
At school we used to regularly play the old game of ‘jacks’, with a small, hard, rubber ball and little metal jacks. I was good at it, finding an ability to scan the way that the jacks had fallen and assess the best way of scooping up two or five or whatever number I needed.… Continue reading Playing games…
Kaleidoscope…
It is early morning and I haven’t got around to putting out the seed yet but I glance out the window and there is a single bird standing motionless on the grass. It’s a greenfinch and once again I’m intrigued, almost dazzled, by its plumage. Set against the green of the grass it is so… Continue reading Kaleidoscope…
The curious ring dove
The lawn needs cutting. The little drop of rain and my sprinkler action last week have made it grow so that the birds have to hunt through the grass for the seed, but it is also rather uneven ground and good to nestle down into and this morning a ring dove settled into a depression… Continue reading The curious ring dove
The key is to keep eating…
The wood pigeons are a curious lot, in that they rarely seem to interact within the garden…that would entail stopping eating. This afternoon there were three occupying much of the grass. Other birds would come and go, the ring dove returned again and again and the reed bunting, abandoning its acrobatics of the day before,… Continue reading The key is to keep eating…
Filling in the gaps…
I missed yesterday’s blog entry…between sickly hedgehogs and a 90th birthday cake…and it wasn’t as though I didn’t have anything to write about. For the first time I saw the reed bunting doing something that I imagine would be part of its behaviour close to the river, in other words amongst reeds. There is a… Continue reading Filling in the gaps…
One of those days…
It’s been an energetic sort of day with a lot of memorable moments. As soon as I lifted the kitchen blind I saw the first parent of the year, a frantic-looking sparrow a-top the ash pile, stuffing something into the gape of a fat youngster. There were some welcome visitors that we don’t see every… Continue reading One of those days…
Scavenging…
There’s something in the snow-in-summer that the sparrows are determined to get at. This morning I thought that the whole matt of foliage was coming alive, shaking and bouncing and then a sparrow’s head popped up, and another, two appeared from the back of the clump, clambering halfway up the little rosebush and then hopping… Continue reading Scavenging…
thekitchensinkbirdwatcher 