story_book's county list

[storye_book]

i'm thinking of doing my county list for yorks this year (i.e. all the birds i spot in yorks in 2007) - but though i'm a long-term birder, i only have shallow or average knowledge (don't know most of my waterbirds), so it would be out of place on a serious twitcher forum. i thought of logging it on this thread - but would anyone mind if i did that? maybe others could do theirs too? a london list would be interesting, for example - and a scottish list? it would be interesting to compare them season by season. any comments?

[georgie]

Storye book,

Just a query - does a county list mean all the birds you see within a year in a particular county irrespective of location? (ie not just your garden, but also anywhere else you might wander).

We do take part in the BTO Garden BirdWatch scheme but then the list of what we see is no doubt pretty short and feeble compared to most other people's! (tiny walled garden of a mid-terrace in the centre of York). But at least I'm pretty sure of what I see there - I suppose it's just as well we aren't visited by vast numbers of waders, because I'd have no idea what they were!

My excitement of last year was seeing a grey wagtail in the garden on Christmas Day - I normally see these on the banks of the Ouse when I walk down the river, but I assume they might visit a garden if they are hungry? It did come back for two days running but then the weather warmed up and I didn't see it again.

I laughed today because we put out mealworms and bread (good wholemeal stuff, all nicely soaked....) and when putting it in the garden you could hear all this excited whistling from around the rooftops. Anyway, as soon as the food was down and we'd got back into the house, a group of about 15 starlings descended and immediately scoffed the mealworms, argued with each other and then flew off. A couple of them came back later to look a bit disdainfully at the bread and give it a peck or two, then they had a stint at the fatballs and then off they went.

Well sorry I'm wandering from topic to topic here. It's back to work tomorrow so for the rest of the week I only see the garden in the dark. I'll look forward to birdwatching again next weekend.

Cheers

Georgie

[storye_book]

hi georgie

sorry for any confusion - i've re-edited my entry to make it clearer.

your grey wagtail story is interesting. here on the river crimple (it's a fast-flowing stream, really) we get grey wagtails breeding in summer. however they used to feed on insects etc. in ivies and russian vines on houses near the road bridge where they nested - but the bridge has recently been rebuilt completely, and the climbers have been tidied off the buildings, so guess what - no wagtails whatever in the stream this last summer. i'm considering getting a water wagtail nest to fix under our own bridge - but hesitating because of the cost - plus current absence of wagtails.

[storye_book]

2nd jan (see notes 1st jan)

1 MISTLE THRUSH
1 STARLING
1 BLACKBIRD
1 GS WOODPECKER (f)
1 COAL TIT (phew gottim)
2 chaffinches
n goldfinches
2 greenfinches
1 robin
2 great tits
1 nuthatch
1 blue tit
1 moorhen
[no definite coaltits yet, tho they're common here, but they're in grab-and-dash mode, so hard to i.d.] all in garden. blackbird, starling and mistlethrush were on holly-berries, looking for all the world like that morris strawberry-thief wallpaper.

on local patch (within walking distance of home)
4 ROOKS
2 MAGPIES
1 WOODPIGEON
6 LONG TAILED TITS
n WRENS (churring and pinking in bushes unseen)

[Jenny]

Nice idea, but will it clag up the forum if we all have a go????

Until told not to, here's my list since New Year's Day: herring gull; shag; little grebe; blackbird; songthrush; blue tit; great tit; coal tit; green finch; chaffinch; wren; goldfinch; collared dove; hoodie; songthrush; heron; whooper swan; mallard; greylag geese; robin; sparrowhawk; pheasant and buzzard. (23) All bar shag, little grebe, heron, mallard and whooper swan from house/garden - it has not been good birdwatching weather up here and we've been coping with power cuts and 24 hours without water (amazing the number of people who've asked me about my waterbutt!!! since that episode!!). I spend most of my time on Mull so will restrict my list to the island. If anyone's interested, Mull Bird Club has a link to sightings each month and a species list (it now also covers Tiree). There's some good photography to view as well and not just of sea eagles!!!

[storye_book]

hi jenny

thanks for joining in - wow, what an exciting list - and a whooper and shag in the garden - even bill oddie would be jealous. i agree about the clogging up - i think we need a separate area in the forum for this theme. i'll ask chris or lisa to see if they can sort something out.

i agree about the weather too. i went up to briscoe wood (woodland trust) which is at the edge of my patch, the other day. it's a grassy field which was planted all over with new trees at the millenium - so as far as the birds are concerned it's grass and scrub, still. i know that pipits are there, and this time of year and inland it would have to be meadow pipits only. but it was blowing a rainy gale, and they were meeping in the grass and didn't show a feather. i'm no expert on meeping (bird calls) so i recorded nothing new from briscoe - and it's a long walk.

but yesterday i went and sat on almscliff crag (local landmark). i could see a flock of about 200 black-headed gulls wheeling and balancing on the wind. they would come past you in a long stream, so you couldn't see the beginning or end. they landed in pasture, grazing on goodness knows what - it's well overgrazed and muddy.

cheers

[Jenny]

Hi Storyebook

Had to go over to other side of island yesterday - more rain, more wind, but did manage to spot some widgeon and a Great Northern Diver. Friend over there has a yellowhammer - "mine" seems to have disappeared!

[Louise]

Hello
I'm new to this so forgive any faux pas !
My rural garden of just over half an acre is in Mayo, Ireland.
The birds spotted so far this year.
Blackbird, blue tit, great tit, coal tit, chaffinch, goldfinch, siskin, greenfich, robin, wren, magpie,song thrush, tree creeper, pied wagtail and tree sparrow.

[Jandy]

Sorry to sound dim, Jenny, but isn't this a forum for members' bird lists? And that's exactly what storye book and others including yourself are providing. (Very interesting clogging-up it is too!) This is not like the soon-to-come Great Garden Birdwatch, where we should be counting the birds seen at a particular moment of time, but a more general listing of sightings. Am I jealous of some of your lists!

[Hevva]

Hi Jandy, I was a bit puzzled by this as well until I had a look at the date of Jenny's post - January 2007 !
Hi and welcome to Louise. If you start a new thread on here with the title of your beautiful part of the world, you can keep adding to it - have a look at some of the others, and then we can all read about the birds of County Mayo. :)