RETURN TO . . . Emsworth Wildlife - Homepage BIRDS IN MY GARDEN Link to . . . Garden recent news MY GARDEN We moved to our present house in Bridge Road, near the centre of Emsworth in May 1997 after spending about 30 years in an old Edwardian house in North Emsworth. The present garden is considerably smaller than my previous one and has fewer species of bird visiting it. However, we are lucky in having a fairly open aspect despite being close to the centre of town. I can see the whole garden from the house and watch at various times during the day. At the end of the garden at the other side of the brick wall is a small stream (the Westbrook), which runs down to Emsworth Millpond. The stream occasionally attracts unusual visitors, like Little Egret, Kingfisher and Grey Wagtail which perch on the wall and sometimes come into the garden. View of the bird feeding area with feeders on the Cherry tree - 1 November 2017 Feeding birds I put food out daily for the birds throughout the year. The tree on the right is a flowering cherry from which I have three seed holders and two fat ball holders. I used to fill the holders exclusively with sunflower hearts, but as an experiment (from October 2017) I used a mixture of sunflower hearts and mixed seed mainly to cut down on the expense of the sunflowers. To encourage the Collared Doves and Woodpigeons to mop up the droppings beneath the feeders I removed the bird table which previously had a supply of bird seed. So far it is working well and I am getting less droppings. I have given up using peanuts in hangers as the birds ignore them and the peanuts go mouldy. I have also stopped using niger seed holders as the seeds constantly fell onto the gound where they created a soggy mess. Birds far prefer sunflower hearts. I put apples out, but they are rarely touched except in very cold weather. There is a bird bath which can be seen in the photo which is well used, particularly by Starlings. Squirrels As I write (Jan 2019) I am getting regular visits from two Grey Squirrels. All my feeders are constructed from metal so the Squirrels do not damage them, but they do take a fair amount of food. They are particularly partial to fat balls. I have tried scattering peanuts to distract them from the feeders, but that did not work. They simply picked up the nuts and buried them around the garden returning to feed on the fat balls,etc. I now love 'em and hate 'em. Cats We don't have a cat, but I think most of our neighbours have at least one. They seem to have regular routes through our garden which I did try to block off, but that was a total failure. Cats are far to agile to be stopped by simple barriers. I invested in a Catwatch which the RSPB said would scare off cats but it did not work. They do stalk birds, hiding behind a bush, but I have not seen a cat actually catch a bird. However, I think they do help to keep the local Brown Rat population under control. Bird recording I have taken part in both BTO garden bird record schemes: Garden Birdwatch (GBW) scheme since its inception in 1995 and Garden Bird Feeding Survey (GBFS) from 1992-97. Weekly records have been kept of the maximum number of birds of each species seen at any one time in the back garden. Only birds that actually use the garden or hunt over the garden (e.g, Swifts) are counted. Those just flying over like gulls and geese are not counted. The list below shows the each bird species seen in the garden up to 12 November 2012 - records completed for 792 weeks. The birds in the list are ranked according to the total number of weeks the species was recorded. The total number is 47. GARDEN BIRD LIST . . . UP TO 12 NOV 2012 TO BE UPDATED SPECIES Rank Weeks Collared Dove 1 764 Backbird 2 696 House Sparrow 3 693 Greenfinch 4 680 Chaffinch 5 632 Blue Tit 6 611 Starling 7 596 Robin 8 507 Woodpigeon 9 460 Goldfinch 10 442 Dunnock 11 425 Great Tit 12 300 Swift 13 199 Magpie 14 180 Song Thrush 15 161 Wren 16 155 Little Egret 17 68 Blackcap 18 54 Long-tailed Tit 19 44 Coal Tit 20 31 Carrion Crow 21 29 Sparrowhawk 21 29 Chiffchaff 23 24 Goldcrest 24 19 Grey Wagtail 25 8 Pied Wagtail 26 7 Siskin 27 6 Willow Warbler 27 6 Black-headed Gull 29 5 Brambling 29 5 Jackdaw 29 5 Kingfisher 29 5 Great Spotted Woodpecker 33 4 Redwing 33 4 Yellowhammer 33 4 Bullfinch 36 3 Feral Pigeon 37 2 Fieldfare 37 2 Mallard 37 2 Pheasant 37 2 Stock Dove 37 2 Turtle Dove 37 2 White Dove 37 2 Cuckoo 44 1 Jay 44 1 Mistle Thrush 44 1 Redstart 44 1 ANNUAL CHANGES IN MY GARDEN BIRDS The above list conceals a good deal of change in the fortunes of the garden birds over the 15 years with some going up the list while others have declined. The big winners have been Goldfinch and Woodpigeon and the main losers were House Sparrow, Starling and Greenfinch. GOLDFINCH Goldfinches have increased dramatically over the years in all gardens, including mine. The big increase came in 2004 when I started using niger seeds, though they now feed exclusively on sunflower hearts from the feeders. From being fairly rare birds in the garden Goldfinches are now my number one bird both in reliability and numbers. The chart gives the mean weekly count of Goldfinches in the garden over each year. There was an unusual fall in 2014.   WOODPIGEON Woodpigeons have steadily increased in my garden over the past 15 years, as they have generally in gardens across the country. The big increase in my garden was between 1998 and 2008 as shown in the following chart , which plots the mean weekly count of Woodpigeons each year. There has been a levelling out after that peak, but they are still a very regular bird in the garden virtually every day.    HOUSE SPARROWS One of the main losers in garden birds has been the House Sparrow. Numbers have been declining fairly steadily in the garden for the past 10 years, much in line with the general decline as recorded in BTO surveys. The mean weekly count in 1998 was 15.4 from where it fell to 6.7 in 2002. There was a recovery to 10.4 in 2005, but then numbers plumetted down to 0.9 in 2012. However, there are signs of a recovery. In 2013 and 2014 House Sparrows were more frequent in the garden and the mean weekly counts showed a modest increase as shown in the chart.   BTO Garden Birdwatch scheme also reported a slight recovery in House Sparrow numbers following a big drop that occurred in the middle of last decade. Since 2008 a noticeable, steady upturn in GBW counts has been recorded. STARLINGS Starling numbers in the garden have also slumped over the years. As shown in the following chart, numbers were very healthy in the early 2000s and they were regularly seen in the garden, sometimes swooping down in huge numbers to take food. But since 2003 numbers have taken a tumble and they are now one of the least seen of the once regular birds. However, like House Sparrow, there appears to have been a slight revival over the past two years as shown in the following chart.   GREENFINCH Greenfinch used to be my top garden bird with a 100% record, and cost me a load of money in sunflower hearts until 2006. However, from 2007 their numbers plumetted. The BTO reported a large decline in the Greenfinch breeding population following the outbreak of trichomonosis in 2006 - from 4.3 million to 2.8 million birds. My garden finches have suffered also from this disease. Sadly, there is no real sign of a permanent recovery.   COLLARED DOVE Collared Dove numbers rapidly increased in the garden from the start of counting in 1997 to a peak in 2008. Since then there has been a sharp slump in numbers. CHAFFINCH Like Collared Dove, Chaffinch numbers have had a slump since 2008. Not sure of the reason, though it is probably associated with the disease trichomonosis which mainly affected the finches.