Saturday 18 April 2020

Lockdown Garden Birding........

                                             March  23rd    to    April 16th 


                                                                
Male Blackcap


Since the Government introduced a national Lockdown most birders have taken to their gardens to get their fix of birdwatching & nature watching.

I have also enjoyed some really good garden birdwatching , and added several new birds to my Garden bird List which now stands at 58 species.


Blue Tit.


I have an array of feeders up in my 'feeder tree' plus a squirrel feeder in my 'Squirrel tree' you can see a theme here no doubt ...

I also have a tree i have called 'Chiffy Tree' as you know doubt can guess , i have seen Chiffchaff in this tree.


Chiffchaff.


I get lot's of  Goldfinch visiting the garden , up to 35+ in the winter with lesser numbers through the Spring & summer , Chaffinch is now up to 3 regular birds (2♂ 1♀) and i was very pleased to add Greenfinch (1♂1♀) to my garden bird list during this Lockdown period.


Greenfinch & Goldfinch.


Really pleased to see at least 4 House Sparrows nest building and Starling, Robin,Blue Tit , Great Tit & Blackbird all doing the same in nearby gardens.

House Sparrow nest Building.

I get lot's of fly over birds which i include on my garden list and that's where the most variety comes from, before lockdown i had seen Golden Plover, Curlew & Marsh Harrier .

Marsh Harrier.

Since Lockdown birds of prey have been quite plentiful , Sparrowhawk on a daily basis and on one occasion 5 birds in the air together,  2 Peregrines & 1 Kestrel plus several Common Buzzard have all been seen.

Little Egret & Grey Heron have been seen plus 2 Cormorant's have been seen on 2 occasions , i finally connected with Mediterranean Gull with 2 birds flying over the garden , i had previously only heard them.

I have been enjoying seeing other local birders in Whitstable posting their garden sightings on twitter (surprised how many of us there is..lol).

My last new garden lifer was 2 Ravens heading inland , and my latest addition to my Lockdown Garden List is : Swallow which brings my Garden Lockdown List up to : 35

Coal Tit.

Well that concludes this blog post as we all start a second period of Lockdown , i will post another updated blog post of the next 3 weeks at the end of this next period.

Stay safe everyone, thanks for reading.