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Grand Designs… Part III – It’s all go! Apologies for the absence of news recently, a thing called a thesis got in the way and took over somewhat. Spring arrived with a bang. Warmer, sunnier days have graced the garden in the last month or so and the woods have been buzzing with activity. The blue tit box (B8) at the bottom of the wood has a nest inside it though unfortunately the other smaller boxes seem empty. Blue tits are also nesting in the hole in the wall of the main house. Perhaps at the end of the season we will re-locate some for next year. A few weeks ago I watched a coal tit wrestling with a ball of sheep’s wool ten times as big as itself. That particular bird has found a nest site in a crack in the wall of one of the outbuildings so we’ll keep an eye on events there. The woodpecker box has been excavated but so too has another hole in the same dead tree. It’s quite exciting waiting to see which one will be used. One pair of nuthatches has nested in an old woodpile at the top of the woods. A pair of great tits is also nesting in a hole in a tree near the lawn. So far just one young blackbird has been seen following its parents around the woods. As Adam and I are stuck in the last century using slide film, it takes a while before pictures can be developed and scanned. Consequently it can be hard to put very recent pictures on the site. Fortunately the other day I happened to have Polly’s compact digital camera from work so I popped outside to see what I could get with it. The quality is not outstanding but at least you can see some of the residents. I have included a picture of the male great tit with a grub at the nest entrance, some feathers and a picture of the blue tit hole in the side of the house. I estimate that in excess of 40 individual birds are visiting the squirrel-proof finch feeder at the top of the woods each day and that’s most likely a conservative guess: it only takes them a few hours to empty it. Goldfinches and greenfinches are now regular visitors too. The great spotted woodpeckers are still regular visitors to the fat feeder and as you can see by the photograph, the smaller birds are not bothered by their presence. The green woodpeckers continue to taunt me by yaffling constantly but never coming close enough for a picture. Chiffchaffs arrived a while ago and I think I saw the first spotted flycatcher on 12th May so we’ll see if they use the boxes placed in the woods. It’s not all happiness though and nature does have its unfortunate moments. As I walked through the wood yesterday a rather loud ‘thud’ caught my ear. Investigating in the lane adjacent to the wood I found a very well developed but very dead, rook chick that had fallen over 50ft from its nest in the canopy. The impact killed it instantly.
There are a number of pheasants in the area that were lucky enough to survive the shooting season. In March, one of these hurt his foot, possibly on a piece of glass and given the cold weather we decided to give him a helping hand. It was not long before just the sight of one of us outside the house would bring him hopping over to get some seed. Soon he was eating out of our hands and his foot was on the mend. Despite jovial accusations from onlookers passing by in the lane that we were “fattening him up”, we continued to help him and his foot improved rapidly. Now, after being christened ‘Brian’, he is a happy resident of the woods, garden and neighbouring meadow. For all the good fortune in his life so far, Brian is lacking one major aspect in his life: a woman. There seems to be a dearth of females in the locality but if Brian can evade the guns another year, maybe, just maybe, there will be a lady pheasant just around the corner… |
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Click here to read Grand Designs Part I Click here to read Grand Designs Part II LINKS BTO
National Nest Box Week RSPB
- nest box designs Lincolnshire
Wildlife Trusts - nest box designs |
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