Female Blackcap... I think?

[htcdude]

Robins are quite territorial and will often chase off other garden birds.

Nige

[RaptorMan101]

In my garden at the moment we have 2 males as I have said and 2 robins as well as at least 5 dunnocks. The dunnocks are constantly seeing each other off. The robins fight each other sometimes and if not will chase off the dunnocks. As for the blackcaps nothing has chased mine off, they sometimes bully other birds around do blackcaps!

Jim

[sweedie]

I havn't noticed any Dunnocks in my garden, plenty of noisy House sparrows, Blue Tits (which i have a soft spot for)they turn up quite randomly never as routine as the H.Sparrows..
I have also noticed a pair of Robins they seem to get bolder everyday lol im sure they have an agreement with the resident blackbird to see off any invaders as they seem to work quite well together lately hahaa! they actually come very close to me now when i go into the garden

Lovely variety you all get, i'm guessing that most of you live in fairly rural locations, unfortunately not the case for me
although moaning aside I was lucky enough to encounter a Male Sparrow Hawk in my garden the other day, think the other visitors need to be extra alert now!

[RaptorMan101]

Originally Posted by sweedie

I havn't noticed any Dunnocks in my garden, plenty of noisy House sparrows, Blue Tits (which i have a soft spot for)they turn up quite randomly never as routine as the H.Sparrows..
I have also noticed a pair of Robins they seem to get bolder everyday lol im sure they have an agreement with the resident blackbird to see off any invaders as they seem to work quite well together lately hahaa! they actually come very close to me now when i go into the garden

Lovely variety you all get, i'm guessing that most of you live in fairly rural locations, unfortunately not the case for me
although moaning aside I was lucky enough to encounter a Male Sparrow Hawk in my garden the other day, think the other visitors need to be extra alert now!

Quite the contrary, I have a fairly average sized garden in a suburban part of an average sized town. I live less than 10 miles from birmingham so really by rural at all !

Jim

[Madmills]

I too have blackcaps here each winter, 2 pairs. Their favoured foods are suet pellets and blocks, sultanas and sunflower hearts !

The robins here are pretty awful, they dive-bomb the finches out of the rowan tree where a lot of seed feeders are.
They harrass the blackcaps, dunnocks and tits too.

[sweedie]

Bit of a shame the Robins are so terrortorial really, i love seeing them, i think mine managed to see the female Blackcap off unfortunately she dosn't seem to have returned since her two day stay

[PMG]

Originally Posted by sweedie

Bit of a shame the Robins are so terrortorial really, i love seeing them, i think mine managed to see the female Blackcap off unfortunately she dosn't seem to have returned since her two day stay

There maybe some 'movement' of small birds when the weather goes mild after a cold frozen spell - its not exactly migration - just moving around perhaps thinking/looking for possible breeding sites ... just why birds leave a perfectly stocked up bird feeding area and move away I've never understood but they do. And unless birds are marked with rings or some disfigurement you can't always see that the birds you are getting one day may not be the birds you see the next! A lot of chaffinches for instance - a flock is a flock and you tend to think that they are the same birds day in day out - but when a 'marked' chaff appears - perhaps with a bad leg - or a brambling one morning and gone after that do you begin to suspect that birds are swapping around a lot of the time?

Pauline

[sweedie]

Yes Pauline, I agree, seem to get constant groups of house sparrows, they are my best customers lol they seem to have a queueing system,one group keep watch from a tree in the neighbors garden while the other group feed then when they leave that group take their turn, other groups like blue tits seem to come less frequently and some times just one on it's own!
would i be right in thinking that robins and blackbirds (male and female) are probably the same ones that i see year in year out, reason i ask is because of how bold they have become in venturing very close to me if i am sat on my little bench in the garden?

As for the other birds this year, they are definate firsts for me, its been lovely, blackcaps, wren, hope mopre pass through

[roseway]

I was surprised (and delighted) to see three pairs of blackcaps in my garden this lunchtime. I've seen one pair through most of the winter, but seeing three pairs was a bit of a wow moment.

[sweedie]

Oh wow, thats fantastic Roseway, like i said , i was pleased to see one, i would love to see a male now... fingers crossed, i will have to follow the advice some of you have given on feeding prefrences and see what happens, they seem to have a sweet tooth