"Miss Perspicacia Tick" wrote in message
...
Martin Sykes wrote:
We've just had our first ever blackcap in the garden, feeding on the
fat balls. My book says they're usually not seen until April and even
then usually in the south so it must be pretty unusual up here in
Cheshire.


We had one here (South Bucks) on Big Birdwatch weekend (29th Jan). What
I'd
really love to see is a house sparrow - they've been absent from my garden
for nearly eight years now. We do have plenty of thrushes (both species)
and
they're on the endangered list - and all three species of woodpecker are
also frequent visitors (ditto). Being as we are in the Chilterns, we also
get the occasional red kite flying overhead. All in all, that weekend, I
must have counted at least 16 species, including four species of tit
(blue,
great, long-tailed and coal), three species of woodpecker, three species
of
finch (green, chaff and gold), warbler (blackcap) three species of
dove/pigeon (collared, wood and rock), robin, wren, dunnock, fieldfare
(though that was in the field over the road) jay, jackdaw, magpie,
nuthatch
and a heron sweeping the pond for early frogs. OK, that's 23. Oh and a
pied
wagtail (that's 24). We used to get grey wagtails here in the winter, but
I've not seen any for many a year. My grandfather (in Little Waltham) has
them most years (but then he has 2 acres of garden and it backs open
country).
--
Facon - the artificial bacon bits you get in Pizza Hut for sprinkling
on salads.



I'm often amazed by the claim that sparrows are in decline. We have dozens
of them here - more than anything else. Apart from the usual suspects, we've
had long-tailed tits, blackcap, a goldcrest and a merlin this year ( the
latter contributing to the reported decline in the sparrow population )

--
Martin & Anna Sykes
( Remove x's when replying )
http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~sykesm