crazy tree in the back yard

garden birds

we had a coal tit in the garden this morning which was cool becuase it is only the fifth time we have ever seen one in the garden. it came onto the feeders for a while before two great big collard doves came and scared it away. still, another great garden record. Photos to follow!

the garden

had about five feildfares in the garden this morning, which is a new garden record for this species. They are really beautiful birds!

a boxing day walk around ogden-in the snow!

a bitter cold morning for a post christmas walk around ogden. I guess the birds must have got the same feeling and stayed away becuase we diddnt see a single one. however, the snow scene was pretty impressive, photos to follow!

at my mums friends house in gomersol...

As we pulled up I noticed that lots of feildfares flew across the road into the trees on the opposite side of the road. feildfares kept drifting over which was nice and the evening light was even more complementary to their coulors.

but then I noticed one bird sitting on the end of a branch had a crest on its head-thus I found phase three of my waxwing winter. there were actually four of them there but only one showed well enough to be identified. it was a nice ending to the year!

in arctic conditions, I miss a med gull

went in vain for the med gull at ogden today. by the time I got there the light was fading and so I assumed that it must have already left to roost. in the spare time I had I took some photos of other gulls in flight, to improve my flight shots.

the november and december freeze-and the return of the missile thrush

An early send home from school today and so spent an hour or so watching the garden birds cope with the snow. the starlings were present, for the first time since last time it snowed, and a variety of our "usuals". the bird table was proving an irresistible temptation to most birds who would willfully come and take some of the fruit we had put out for them! the first of these was the starlings who had to redeem themselves for their skiving behavior.

its sad to see the birds looking so sad and cold in the conditions, but we had done all we can-feeding and water. After all, we cant exactly invite them into the house (can we?)!

As you may have assumed from the title, our local mistle thrush has been around again, taunting me with his (or her) camera shyness. you may have also assumed that I have very bad spelling based on the title, but oh no! with this bird comes a frightful temper which is more like a missile!

however I was at by the window photographing starlings and blackbirds when he came and alighted on the pole feeder. he sat there for about 1min, checking the coast was clear and then...

flew straight onto the bird table right in front of me. I couldn't believe it. I managed to get some resonable shots before he flew off, but they look great!

after he left the other birds quickly came back. first of all was this blackbird who might, for all I know, have been trying to build a snowman on his beak! he did look quite comical, although most of it had fallen off by the time the camera was there and so the photos did him little justice.

a dunnock also came but was rather shouldered towards the edge by the bigger blackbird.

But then came a challenge! every year we seem to get starlings and blackbirds fighting at the birdtable (bad manners) and this year was no exception. only this year the starlinmgs seemed to be doing better than the blackbirds, maybe numbers, but it made for some decent photos!

And finally a robin came to join in the snow fun.

but for all this, the weather was pretty impressive. but after all, winter should be like this!