OverClockers Twitchers' Thread

Narj

Narj

Narj

Soldato
Joined
19 Feb 2010
Posts
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Location
London
This has been discussed a couple of times so I thought I'd start it. Lockdown has made many of us a lot more appreciative of nature and the wildlife around us so bird-feeding and spotting has become a bit more popular.

I thought it'd be nice to share your interesting sightings here, have some friendly discussion and share tips and experiences :)

I'll kick off with a sighting - first successful kill in my garden by a Sparrowhawk this morning - looks like a female and she'd bagged a poor Sparrow. Unfortunately I only had my potato phone to hand so the photo is awful, I've tried to brush it up. It's been too wet to mow/sort out the grass, before I get piled on :D

sparrowhawk.png


Also a tip I'd like to share for dealing with vermin as this is quite a common issue. A while back I had an issue with a rat getting to my bird table/house. I managed to get around the problem with a couple of pint beer-cans (see above). Cut the top and bottom off with strong scissors, turn them inside out and fold around the post, fixing with self-tapping screws. I spray with WD-40 for good measure and you can see the sod can no longer get up there and has moved on: Frustrated Rat Video!

Obviously for ground feeders I only put out what I know will be eaten in the day to discourage vermin.

As for the species I have currently seen visiting: Sparrow, Tree Sparrow, Goldfinch, Starling, Pied Wagtail, Magpie, Collared Dove, Wood Pigeon, Robin, Blackbird, Sparrowhawk.

Not many Feral Pigeons thankfully and I tend to scare them off with a laser pointer if they become too much of a problem (green is best). :)

Look forward to seeing other people's stuff - I'm going to try to use my wildlife cam to get some close-up photos of the Robin that seems to have claimed the garden as its territory now.
 
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I looked out my office window the other day and saw this beauty:

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I've had my falconry license for years now but yet to convince my missus to let me get a harris hawk, watch this space :p
 
I've started putting some bird feeders out recently. It's good fun watching the different species arrive, so far I have spotted:

Robin
Blue Tit
Great Tit
Long Tailed Tit
Blackbird
Pigeon
Magpie
Sparrow
Goldfinch
Greenfinch
Jay

But it's the damn squirrels that keep knocking all the seeds to the floor that are annoying me. Might have to stick the feeders on a greased pole to solve it.

I've found that when I've put mixed seed out and sunflower hearts. Apart from the Robin, the sunflower hearts get eaten first every time and they certainly attract the goldfinches.

I'm hoping something nests in my birdbox in the spring. Just need some binoculars now!
 
Stumble Bum said:
But it's the damn squirrels that keep knocking all the seeds to the floor that are annoying me. Might have to stick the feeders on a greased pole to solve it.

I've found that when I've put mixed seed out and sunflower hearts. Apart from the Robin, the sunflower hearts get eaten first every time and they certainly attract the goldfinches.

I'm hoping something nests in my birdbox in the spring. Just need some binoculars now!
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Goldfinches go absolutely nuts for Sunflower hearts. :D I had groups of 5 or 6 in the summer but they are much less frequent of late. The problem with Sunflower hearts is that Wood Pigeons go crazy for them as well and will try all sorts of tricks to get at them. It's pretty entertaining to watch but it took me weeks of frustration before I managed to outsmart them.

I've just got a new feeder that will only allow the smaller birds anywhere near so will stuff that with sunflower hearts rather than having it somewhere the bigger birds will try, scaring the others off.

You can get squirrel baffles for poles but grease will work equally well I'd have thought. Depending on the type of feed, you can get squirrel proof ones that shut the ports when they jump on to them.

I haven't seen a single Blue Tit - odd as my mate around the corner gets lots of them and I see plenty on walks.

Will Gill said:
I looked out my office window the other day and saw this beauty:
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Absolutely stunning, well caught. :)
 
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We get loads of twitchers visit us down here, we have loads and loads of egrets which are fairly rare:

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Got an invasion of long tailed ****, and some other randoms

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lil baby:
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I was in the living room and looked out to see a heron sat on the fence at the end of last year. I only had my potato to hand so the picture is rubbish and by the time I'd ran upstairs to get my camera, he'd gone.

CseARw4.jpg

The missus has become a bit obsessed with bird watching so we get quite a variety of different birds in the garden thanks to all the seeds she puts out. We've also now got binoculars dotted around the house and a subscription to bird watching magazine!

Last summer, we had a Song Thrush take up residency in our garden who proceeded to spend the next few months mimicking various alarms that it had heard.
 
Loads of wildlife here in London, on Friday mornings when I'm in the car by 6ish I always see tons of foxes on the way to work. I just wish we had red squirrels, those grey buggers are vermin :(
 
Think we are really lucky because we have a big crew of goldfinches that come daily to feed. Used to be 3 or 4 and now we are getting up to 7 at a time.
Great ****, coal ****, blue **** and long tailed **** all come. Sadly long tailed very infrequent.
A green finch started to come in the past couple of weeks.
Blackbirds, robins and pigeons (plus grotty city pigeons) all daily visitors as is a wren.
Magpies and a pair of Jays also come regularly. We get green parakeets on occasion as well as thrushes and a female chaffinch.
Woodpecker came for a few weeks last year too.
Sparrow hawk once and once a Merlin (we think) took a flying attack at a goldfinch on the feeder.
I think so many come because we are one of the few places round here that has shrubs and trees and bird feeders out. Always enjoy looking out at our tiny garden and seeing all the birds there.

slow day out there today though. Gonna do the garden bird watch in a bit and hopefully some visitors will come!
 
Stumble Bum said:
Strange isn't it. The blue tit's are pretty much in my garden non-stop. Bored of them now :p, I want to swap for more Goldfinches :D
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I think the Pied Wagtails are my favourite at the moment. I just can't help laughing/smiling watching them although they tend to pick round on the rooftops more than visiting the garden. :D
 
We have a starling colony that seem to have called home one of our bushes, probably about 6 of them, also get various ****, robin, blackbirds, pigeons, wood pigeons, collared doves, dunnocks, sometimes a rare sparrow, jackdaws, magpies, used to see a jay often but in the past year nothing, can also hear some finches closes by but despite putting out the right food they never visit
 
I've really grown into twitching in the last couple of years, since meeting my ex. I've just bought a uk bird id book, have 5 feeders on the go, a 6th in the post, and often go wondering camera in hand.

From my album here: https://www.flickr.com/gp/sameermannick/820peN

DSC_1029-2 by Sameer Mannick, on Flickr

DSC_5064 by Sameer Mannick, on Flickr

DSC_5078 by Sameer Mannick, on Flickr

DSC_5101 by Sameer Mannick, on Flickr

DSC_5086 by Sameer Mannick, on Flickr

DSC_5151 by Sameer Mannick, on Flickr

DSC_5392 by Sameer Mannick, on Flickr

DSC_5409 by Sameer Mannick, on Flickr
 
I put a bird feeder up in the garden and it is actually surprisingly nice watching the squirrels birds eat from it. The robin is massive wimp and takes a tiny bite before disappearing for 5 minutes but a brown and green tit thing is much more ballsy and does trips to and from his nest every minute or so.
 
almoststew1990 said:
I put a bird feeder up in the garden and it is actually surprisingly nice watching the squirrels birds eat from it. The robin is massive wimp and takes a tiny bite before disappearing for 5 minutes but a brown and green tit thing is much more ballsy and does trips to and from his nest every minute or so.
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My resident Robin is more confident in the caged ground feeder and will stuff its face there, but otherwise yeah it's smash and grab. I've seen it stand up for itself when harassed by the Sparrows though. :)

The Starlings are possibly the most ballsy I've seen - they will basically give it, "Oi, **** off mate!" to the Feral pigeons. There is 1 seemingly regular Starling that doesn't really care about my presence, I think it must be the one that started coming to my garden as a juvenile.
 
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