General Chat

Thought it would be nice to do a garden watch & list what animals you can see in your gardens in the lockdown, It can be any kind of wild life, birds, butterflies, anything. We all live in different kinds of houses, flats etc. All nature is busy at the moment.
Even from a window if you are in a flat. We have a pair of swans nesting in next doors garden for 4th year running, no eggs yet but nest looks like it is finished so should be soon.

We had two ducks visit us yesterday. A real surprise :-D

We have birds squabbling over whose turn it is for a bath, yesterday a blackbird was in the bird bath for ages with a sparrow trying to join him. The sparrow gave up, further up the garden a blue tit was also having a bath in a different bird bath and up on the patio a bit later a magpie had a bath and shower from the water feature.
this week we have seen two orange tip butterflies a small tortoiseshell and a couple of cabbage whites. there are not as many birds feeding at the moment just Great tits and collard doves.

Blackbird nest next to our living room window - grandstand view :-D

Just hopped over neighbours fence at bottom of garden while swans on river, they have 1 egg, they lay every other day untill finished laying then sit so all hatch out same time. Will sit for 6 weeks. Each year she has laid more, last year had 10 eggs, 9 hatched & 7 survived. Been doing some digging & Robin around, also seen the wren today.

WE've had 12 Jackdaws on the front lawn this afternoon. Jenny wren has been for her mealworms and oh has a Robin who feeds from the rail around the pond. The Robin takes worms away and feeds his mate up by the box hedge so I think they may be nesting there this year.

I have had Phil and Philomena Pheasent round the back patio for their corn when I do the chickens. Just went round there and corned the big girls and two pheasents flew over my head just a couple of feet above me.

We've also had a few Brimstone butterflies and two small tortoiseshell ones and some other ones which I could'nt tell you what they were.

The solitary bees are busy around the hole in the bamboo box so its all happening down here.

Mel North Devon.

I have at least two hedgehogs feeding from cat biscuits left out for them with water bowls nearby. They usually appear separately but as I couldn't distinguish between them I wasn't sure if it was one greedy one coming back for seconds! The other night one was tucking in and another came along and barged the first one away. They had a bit of a tussle, one rolling itself up in a ball and both disappeared.

I saw one eating biscuits this evening but because I am not watching constantly others might be visiting too. I am now out of biscuits but have some tinned catfood to use and a bag of hedgehog food so can continue to put food out.

We have numerous bird feeders out, and have robins, blackbirds, blue tits, finches, sparrows, starlings (nesting in the gutters next door), and noisy pigeons. Sometimes there are magpies and jays in the hazel tree or fir tree which are at the end of our garden next to the hedge. The garden ends about 35ft from the house so it's easy to watch from the window. On the other side of our hedge is a field, unplanted this year as there have been people testing the water table. Gulls wheel across the field often.

Sadly the field is up for sale as a building plot for houses, something we definitely don't want. It's often waterlogged so the last thing we need is housing which will cause more water in our gardens, quite apart from the noise and dust of a building site for months and the loss of the view and noise of more households so close to us! There Is currently a flight path over the field and sometimes the Red Arrows circle over it before landing at Norwich airport close by.

Lizxx

The swans in next doors garden hatched yesterday, 7 cygnets all grey & fluffy & really cute. Bit of panic as well yesterday as the crows were kicking off at about 4.30am, got up to look out the window & a fox was in the garden but the male swan saw it off, then last evening another swan flew in, don't know where it come from but again male saw it off, thought there was going to be real trouble as very territorial. They will most likely take little ones on river today, then they leave the nest & move further up to another spot. :-)

Hilary, that's lovely to have swans so near you. The parents are protecting their young so well.
One of my local walks takes me near a swan's nest. They hatched 4 eggs a few weeks ago and the young cygnets are doing well with their daily swims on the water. They have been much photographed by local people during lockdown and now go quite some distance each day.
On a different route, I saw moorhen chicks this week. There were 4 tiny balls of black fluff mooching about in the weed.

Keep your distance from the moorhen chicks or you dreams will be shattered. Close up, they are hideous!

We have the odd buzzard circling and the neighbour has blue-tits in his nest box. They flit in and out.

We specialize in slugs and are doing our best to give them a balanced diet it would appear.

the sparrows and blue tits are flitting about but shock horror, one unwanted guest shot across the garden a big brown rat
ugh

A badger came to visit the garden the other night :-D

Frogs :-D

Well I have a variety of birds that I feed usually on the front lawn.There is Florrie & Robbie my pair of robins.They were collecting grass etc to obviously make a nest somewhere but they fly off so quick I cant see where it is.
Plenty of blackbirds, sparrows and crows plus a hungry seagull called greedy George who sits on the roof waiting for me!
I have a pair of doves nesting in my trees but have no idea who they belong to but they make a lot of noise. The cuckoo is still around making his noise too.

Sharron, there are so many slugs in my garden.I really don't know where they come from.Im afraid I murder them with salt in order to protect my plants!!

Across the road there was also a huge rat that disappeared down a hole and now I do not leave the door open.
I have seen quite a few cabbage white butterflies but no other varieties.
We also get a few buzzards too.
Just never realised just how much wildlife I have in my garden

Florence in the hebrides!

Our London Plane tree is full of finches. Also a tree along the road is full of parakeets! Wonderful colours.

Also, foxes quite happily trot down the street in the afternoon.

Strange for the middle of Town.

Cygnets had their 1st trip on river yesterday, on & off all day, suppose like all babies short bursts then back to nest to sleep. Seen more birds this year, lots of all kinds of Tits, & Finches & Yellow Hammers, also lots of different Butterflies. Maybe they are always there but too busy to notice them but with the lockdown had more time.
MowtownGal, Maybe the foxes are about in the day time because they have young ones, heard the other day that Urban Foxes have been having a hard time while we have been in lockdown, no litter on streets from takeaways & now no one has dustbins they can get into, we all seem to have wheelie bins. Feel sorry for them really. Love those Parakeets.

Blackbirds
Sparrows
Goldfinches
Greenfinches
Bullfinches
Wrens
Great tits
Magpies
Starlings
Robins
Sparrowhawk (seen once)
Heron (not seen but has depleted our pond fish!)
Newts
Bats (don't know what sort)
Numerous damselflies
Also saw a barn owl flying in broad daylight, across our local fields.

Heron on the river bank this morning, also saw the biggest fish I have seen in the river this morning, not a pike. Fishing matches held on river in the winter so this 1 may have been caught many times.

My neighbour's cat seems to have taken up permanent residence under my back garden bench.

I was wondering why my bird feeder was not been used these last few days.

Lovely friendly cat nonetheless. :-D

I keep reading the op as MATURE garden watch

Mind wanders to watching a different species of Birds...