Essex Birds!

[crissie]

Ok my list starts today and I'm including the birds who visit since spring commenced, hope it might be of interest to any members living in Essex, especially.
I live on a small housing estate in a small cul de sac, our garden is a reasonable size for a newish house and its positioned near two huge oak trees, may as well say one is in my garden as its right next to my fence.
There are three gardens to the left and then lots of shrub, trees and a bypass, next to the by pass the essex country side, huge fields etc.
i have a pond in my garden, no fish and its a very small pond with a waterful and lots of cobbles then the lawn.

Birds who feed daily in my garden.....
small charm of Goldfinches
Blue tits pair
One coal tit
Long tailed tits (pair now was a smalll flock in winter.)
Great tits pair
Two dunnocks
Robins pair
male and female black bird
one male chaffinch.
pair of collared doves
Two wood pigeons
3 or 4 starlings

Ocaisional feeders...
Song Thrush
Green finch male and female.

Update.... Green finches seem to be feeding daily now too instead of occasionally

Update 26th april 2010.. Magpie has come back again, a couple were here in the winter but have been gone from near my garden for the last couple of months, one is now back on neighbouring roofs and trees and has occasionally entered the garden and had a drink, I don't feed to attract magpies.
Green finches are not comming daily now.

[chilternbirder]

When I lived in Billericay we never had goldfinches in the garden athough they were regulars on thistles surrounding an empty unit on the industrial estate. We did get regular sparrows in those days and also reed buntings which were rather a suprise at first.

[crissie]

Hi there,
I live quite along way from Billericay.
I'm chuffed with the goldfinches as they are so striking and their lovely smooth flowing sound is one of my favourites. My young son is well impressed when he hears them too and has successfully identified them through listening as they have made such a good impression on him. He often tells me when they are around and on their way to my garden.

Sparrows are around when I'm out and about but in very small numbers.
We only ever get a sparrow in the garden in winter, and then only one or maybe two on the odd occasion.

We seem to have more starlings locally.

It would be lovely to get a reed bunting in my garden, my eyes are always on the look out.
I saw a little egret down at the river the other day, I'd never seen one in our area before. I say it was in the river but actually its part of the river where the level of water had gone down loads, so I suppose its better described as a stream.

My parents live two miles away with a fabulous garden and next to a field and this river, I love watching the birds there as they have alot more species than I do. However they have loads of Green finches and luckily for them Bull finches but they don't get goldfinches on a daily basis, (strange)they may spot one now and again.

[crissie]

To add to my list in the first post Mr. Chaffinch now has a wife,
She is here many times a day with her man, extremely handsome pair.
To my surprise today I looked out and she was on the sunflower hearts feeder, I was most surprised as I had only seen her on the trellis and ground feeding with her hubby.

I'm now shooing the magpie away, he has dive bombed the wood pigeons and doves and starlings. The smaller birds keep away when he/she is about. I only have to make a hissing sound and off it goes. Some of you may not agree with me doing this but I don't feed large morsels of food to encourage it and now its spring apart from meal worms (yes I know magpie would relish these) I don't place any food on the bird table, I only use the hanging feeders and the ground feeders clear up for me. I do sprinkle seed on the ground in the early morning about 6 AM.

I don't want this magpie to pick up any fledglings and I think thats what he/she has turned up for.

8th may 2010 update Along with the magpie we have had a Jay this afternoon, sitting in front of the window on the fence, don't know how long he had been around. Another predator of song birds eggs and chicks....all nature I know! very impressive to see such a large colourful bird so near, we had a perfect view, considering the Jay is known to be a shy bird I was quite surprised to see him.
Two magpies are around now.

8Th may 2010 Really sad news at the moment, hope its only a temporary blip....
My Goldfinches have not come for two days, they were here on and off all day every day, hope its due to time of year/breeding and all that nesting. We were so used to the Goldie's being here, I didn't even watch them all the time they were here because I new they were so regular, now i really am missing them.

9th may 2010 wrote the above yesterday and to my surprise a little later a couple of goldfinches came to feed.
I'm putting their absence for the past two days down to the breeding season.

15th may.. update
The gold finches are still feeding daily I'm glad to say, The Jay has been putting in a few appearances, what an impressive bird I must say. Funnily enough, I heard the jay a couple of weeks ago and since then I've been seeing him/her,

[crissie]

22/ may 2010 Some of the residents are feeding less than usual but the Gold finches are back on track and I can hear them most of the time now and they seem to be feeding as regular as usual.
Some of the residents have been seen coming for a drink and a bath only, especially in the morning.
The blues and greats have began to feast on the fat loads more than normal, apparently this is because they feed their chicks on the suet.

The Jay has been here daily, until yesterday, not seen him today either.
The nag pie has been seen having a drink now and then, this obviously makes life for the little fledglings a bit dicey.

I have noticed that the juvenile starlings learn really quickly, they are getting quite aggressive. They very quickly start looking like adults too.

On a different note the collared doves have been seen mating on the fence for two weeks running! Same place on the fence too :eek:

[Beebee]

22/ may 2010
On a different note the collared doves have been seen mating on the fence for two weeks running! Same place on the fence too :eek:

You should tell them to "get a room" don't they realise there's children about. :D

BTW, I know have my answer to my question to you in my latest post in the thread titled "Help with garden birds".

[crissie]

You should tell them to "get a room" don't they realise there's children about. :D


yes, they seem to be sticking with same place and similar time too.
The thing was, the second time the kids were about and they were amazed to watch.

I felt sorry fort the female, she was being really squashed down onto the top of the fence! At least it didn't last long.
Its not very often that I know which one is male and female.

A couple of days later they were on the same part of the fence and he( I imagine it was the male) was preening her. He started pecking round her neck anf face then he pecked and caught her right in the eye. The funny thing was that after pecking her eye every time he progressed upwards from her neck she wisely closed her eye and kept it closed until he'd stopped pecking.
Clever lady,

[Beebee]

A couple of days later they were on the same part of the fence and he( I imagine it was the male) was preening her. He started pecking round her neck anf face then he pecked and caught her right in the eye. The funny thing was that after pecking her eye every time he progressed upwards from her neck she wisely closed her eye and kept it closed until he'd stopped pecking.
Clever lady,


Clever indeed, sometimes it's just better to let him get on with it, that way it's over with much quicker. ;)