On 12/10/07 07:04, in article ,
"JakeD" wrote:

On Thu, 11 Oct 2007 23:28:42 +0100, Sacha
wrote:
snip
The Tawny Owls are flying
again and I heard them at 6am today in the garden. Just a few nights ago we
went to our local for supper and could hear a parent in a nearby tree
calling the young. I think that's all part of the training them to feed and
to maintain a territory. Whatever it is, it's wonderful! Having lost two
trees in the neighbouring churchyard in which they both roosted and nested,
the rooks are now noisily sorting out new territory for themselves in our
garden. The main hub of their activity has always been the Atlantic cedar
at the end of our main lawn but we think they're now going to colonise a
copper beech even more heavily - thus inevitably hastening its demise - and
are taking over another conifer that they have, so far, ignored.

Thank you for the response and advice. Yes, tawny owls are wonderful
to hear, aren't they? Each one seems to have a different call. Last
Summer I went off hiking and camping on my own in the wilds. Soon
after I was bedded down, the silence was broken by a tawny owl up in a
tree, directly overhead. Gorgeous sound. So much more musical than the
call of the crow which you also mentioned... They sound almost
ominous to me. Where I live, they seem to throng in the big trees
surrounding a big spooky old dilapidated country house near here, the
spooky inhabitant of which no-one ever quite sees...

JD

Then those are rooks. Three crows together are rooks, one rook alone is a
crow. ;-) Rooks are extremely sociable creatures and some colonies remain
in situ for hundreds of years. They're also supposed to bring good luck!
I'm so used to their noise now that I miss them if they're silent. The
tawnies do seem to have different calls, yes. Certainly there's a
territorial one and then a high pitched one on a single note which is
parents and young communicating.

--
Sacha
http://www.hillhousenursery.co.uk
South Devon
(remove weeds from address)
'We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our
children.'

In message , JennyC
writes

"JakeD" wrote
I have now tried several kinds of bird-feed, including fat balls,
peanits and various seeds, all hung in net bags outside my bedroom
window, so I can see what's eating what.

The only birds that ever come for a snack are great tits! (Black head,
yellow breast.) They only eat the peanuts and some large seeds that
look something like pumpkin seeds.

I wish I knew what would appeal to some of the other birds in the
garden.
JD


Just in time for the RSPB "Feed the Birds Day" - 27-10-07 :~))))
http://www.rspb.org.uk/feedthebirds/index.asp
Also has 'what to feed'
http://www.rspb.org.uk/advice/helpin...ding/index.asp


Somewhat irrelevant American site - but it has wonderful pictures of
hummingbirds :~)
http://www.birds.cornell.edu/pfw/Abo.../BirdFoods.htm

jenny

The downside of feeding birds, though, is that they come to rely on it,
and while they are fine in summer and autumn, I feel really bad about
going away in winter and early spring, thinking about all those empty
little stomachs.

We have also been adopted by a flock of doves. The flock has resided
four doors from us for some 30 years, but the dovecot-maker who was
raising them presumably fed them. Recently he has had health issues, and
also I imagine the dovecote business is suffering due to bird flu, so we
have been discovered by two dozen hungry doves, from various sides of
the blanket (most of them white, but some interesting spotty variants,
or pigeon in front, dove in back. The downside to the variation is that
those can be recognised, and invariably they are the ones taken by the
sparrow hawk...). Unfortunately this means that even though we buy seed
etc. in huge bags, it is impossible to feed the ground feeders, as every
grain is immediately scoffed by doves.

--
Klara, Gatwick basin

* JakeD wrote, On 11/10/2007 22:22:
On Thu, 11 Oct 2007 14:24:13 +0100, Char Kenny
wrote:


Can the birds really tell a difference?

I have now tried several kinds of bird-feed, including fat balls,
peanits and various seeds, all hung in net bags outside my bedroom
window, so I can see what's eating what.

The only birds that ever come for a snack are great tits! (Black head,
yellow breast.) They only eat the peanuts and some large seeds that
look something like pumpkin seeds.

I wish I knew what would appeal to some of the other birds in the
garden.

What other birds do you know are in the area and that you particularly
want to attract?

I find that by far the most popular food is sunflower seeds; when I've
fed seed mixes, of any kind, there's a huge amount of waste, as the
birds pick out the sunflower seeds and leave most of the rest! The
only exception to this is the mix I get for the ground feeders, which
is pretty much like muesli.

Nowadays I feed sunflower hearts, peanuts and ground feeders' muesli
throughout the year and add fat balls in the winter. That attracts a
pretty wide range of birds. As well as what to feed, it's well worth
considering where. The birds will feel a lot more confident if
there's cover close to hand, along with perches to use before and
after feeding.



--
Cheers, Serena
If you are going through hell, keep going. (Winston Churchill)

"Serena Blanchflower" wrote
What other birds do you know are in the area and that you particularly
want to attract?

I find that by far the most popular food is sunflower seeds; when I've fed
seed mixes, of any kind, there's a huge amount of waste, as the birds pick
out the sunflower seeds and leave most of the rest! The only exception to
this is the mix I get for the ground feeders, which is pretty much like
muesli.

Nowadays I feed sunflower hearts, peanuts and ground feeders' muesli
throughout the year and add fat balls in the winter. That attracts a
pretty wide range of birds. As well as what to feed, it's well worth
considering where. The birds will feel a lot more confident if there's
cover close to hand, along with perches to use before and after feeding.
Cheers, Serena

I have some photo's of the birds we get here in the city (Rotterdam)
I have fat balls, peanuts, a bird table for bread, cake, rice, old
cornflakes, muesli etc :~))
There's a link at the bottom over the page about feeding:
http://www.ljconline.nl/garden/Plant...onth/Birds.htm
Jenny

In reply to K ) who wrote this in
, I, Marvo, say :

If you just use hanging feeders you don't attract the ground feeders
(robins, blackbirds, dunnocks), but if you scatter food on the ground,
move it around a lot so you don't accumulate mess and the possibility
of disease.

I've got great tits.

You know what I mean.

On Fri, 12 Oct 2007 10:36:28 +0200, "JennyC"
wrote:

Just in time for the RSPB "Feed the Birds Day" - 27-10-07 :~))))
http://www.rspb.org.uk/feedthebirds/index.asp
Also has 'what to feed'
http://www.rspb.org.uk/advice/helpin...ding/index.asp

Ah - thank you! What an appropriate and useful site! Looks like it has
the answers! Funny; I'm an RSPB member, but I had not seen that site
before...

JD

On Fri, 12 Oct 2007 11:02:05 +0100, Serena Blanchflower
wrote:

What other birds do you know are in the area and that you particularly
want to attract?

Hi Serena,

From a practical POV, I would like to attract anything that will be
beneficial to my vegetable patch. That is to say, particularly
anything that also likes slugs and snails!

From a purely visula/auditory pleasure POV, I'd be interested in
attracting anything that is colourful, with a pleasant musical song. I
have seen wrens, robins, cahaffinches, magpies, spotted flycatchers
(?) blue tits (?) and a few others I would be even more hesitant
hesitate to identify, along with the very very occasional, but much
appreciated kingfisher (there's a river nearby). A neigbour claims to
have seen buzzards circling nearby (there's an RSPB bird sanctuary
about half a mile away)!

I find that by far the most popular food is sunflower seeds; when I've
fed seed mixes, of any kind, there's a huge amount of waste, as the
birds pick out the sunflower seeds and leave most of the rest! The
only exception to this is the mix I get for the ground feeders, which
is pretty much like muesli.

I didnl;t realise there were specifically ground-feeder birds. Perhaps
that's why I'm only seeing great tits at the moment.

Nowadays I feed sunflower hearts, peanuts and ground feeders' muesli
throughout the year and add fat balls in the winter. That attracts a
pretty wide range of birds. As well as what to feed, it's well worth
considering where. The birds will feel a lot more confident if
there's cover close to hand, along with perches to use before and
after feeding.

Thanks for the tip. There is a large spruce tree ouside my window. I
'll try moving the feeders back onto that. I'll still be able to see
the show from my window there.

Thanks again...

JD

On Fri, 12 Oct 2007 12:12:05 +0200, "JennyC"
wrote:


There's a link at the bottom over the page about feeding:
http://www.ljconline.nl/garden/Plant...onth/Birds.htm

That's interesting - thanks for that. Two of the birds in your photos
are also common in my garden: sparrows and wood pigeons. I rather like
the sound wood pigeons make.

JD

* JakeD wrote, On 12/10/2007 12:08:

That's interesting - thanks for that. Two of the birds in your photos
are also common in my garden: sparrows and wood pigeons. I rather like
the sound wood pigeons make.

Both of those are largely ground feeders, although the sparrows will
sometimes use a seed feeder. In my garden they do a good job of
clearing up any sunflower seeds which are dropped from the feeder.


--
Cheers, Serena
People are forever calling me a hypochondriac and, let me tell you,
that makes me sick.

* JakeD wrote, On 12/10/2007 12:05:
On Fri, 12 Oct 2007 11:02:05 +0100, Serena Blanchflower
wrote:

What other birds do you know are in the area and that you particularly
want to attract?

Hi Serena,

From a practical POV, I would like to attract anything that will be
beneficial to my vegetable patch. That is to say, particularly
anything that also likes slugs and snails!

From a purely visula/auditory pleasure POV, I'd be interested in
attracting anything that is colourful, with a pleasant musical song. I
have seen wrens, robins, cahaffinches, magpies, spotted flycatchers
(?) blue tits (?) and a few others I would be even more hesitant
hesitate to identify, along with the very very occasional, but much
appreciated kingfisher (there's a river nearby). A neigbour claims to
have seen buzzards circling nearby (there's an RSPB bird sanctuary
about half a mile away)!

The finches and tits are likely to use a seed feeder as well as
picking up any seeds which fall to the ground. The wrens and robins
are both ground feeders but will take sunflower hearts (but probably
not whole sunflowers) from the ground. They also love the ground
feeders' muesli that I put down. Wrens are fairly shy birds, so are
most likely to take food if it's near cover. Magpies along with
other, larger, birds are more likely to take food from the ground or
from a table (without a roof), although I have seen some large birds,
such as the Jay and the Greater Spotted Woodpecker using both peanut
and seed feeders.

I don't know what, if any, birdfood would encourage the spotted
flycatcher and I don't think that any birdseed is going to interest
either the kingfisher or the buzzard!

I get my seed from http://www.vinehousefarm.co.uk/, who are very
good but Haith's, in particular, do a wide range of softbill mixes
(see http://www.haiths.com/category-Softbill-Foods-WBFSOFT/), to
attract the birds like robins, wrens, blackbirds and thrushes. I've
found these birds seem to do pretty well on Vine House Farm's ground
feeder mix though.

I find that by far the most popular food is sunflower seeds; when I've
fed seed mixes, of any kind, there's a huge amount of waste, as the
birds pick out the sunflower seeds and leave most of the rest! The
only exception to this is the mix I get for the ground feeders, which
is pretty much like muesli.

I didnl;t realise there were specifically ground-feeder birds. Perhaps
that's why I'm only seeing great tits at the moment.

Yes, different birds have different diets and feeding habits. Not all
of them are able to cling onto peanut feeders, for example and others
have problems opening hard seeds, preferring nice soft insectlife.
Some are also shyer than others and are unlikely to join a scrum at a
feeder.

Nowadays I feed sunflower hearts, peanuts and ground feeders' muesli
throughout the year and add fat balls in the winter. That attracts a
pretty wide range of birds. As well as what to feed, it's well worth
considering where. The birds will feel a lot more confident if
there's cover close to hand, along with perches to use before and
after feeding.

Thanks for the tip. There is a large spruce tree ouside my window. I
'll try moving the feeders back onto that. I'll still be able to see
the show from my window there.

Thanks again...


Good luck!

--
Cheers, Serena
Nothing right in my left brain. Nothing left in my right brain (anon)

On 12/10/07 12:08, in article ,
"JakeD" wrote:

On Fri, 12 Oct 2007 12:12:05 +0200, "JennyC"
wrote:


There's a link at the bottom over the page about feeding:
http://www.ljconline.nl/garden/Plant...onth/Birds.htm

That's interesting - thanks for that. Two of the birds in your photos
are also common in my garden: sparrows and wood pigeons. I rather like
the sound wood pigeons make.

JD

But I don't think you'll like the pigeons in your veg. patch. ;-(


--
Sacha
http://www.hillhousenursery.co.uk
South Devon
(remove weeds from address)
'We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our
children.'

On Fri, 12 Oct 2007 14:03:37 +0100, Sacha
wrote:

But I don't think you'll like the pigeons in your veg. patch. ;-(

Thanks for the warning. Acrually, they aren't profuse around here. I
occasionally hear one crooning away on the chimney stack.

JD

On Fri, 12 Oct 2007 10:55:37 +0100, Klara wrote
(in article ):

snip
sparrow hawk...). Unfortunately this means that even though we buy seed
etc. in huge bags, it is impossible to feed the ground feeders, as every
grain is immediately scoffed by doves.


We have a large cage on the ground (from a local metalwork place) in which we
put food for the ground feeding birds. Keeps off pigeons, magpies,
squirrels, and cats! It's like a heavy bottomless box with mesh sides, if
you can imagine what I mean.


--
Sally in Shropshire, UK
Burne-Jones/William Morris window in Shropshire church with conservation
churchyard:
http://www.whitton-stmarys.org.uk

We get sparrows, tits (various) green finches, chaffinches, starlings, and a couple of great spotted woodpeckers on the peanut feeder. On the seed one we get the same except the woodpeckers, but the robin will happily use it. Just about all of them use the fat balls plus the the jackdaws (it's great fun watching them trying to cling on. Anything on the bird table is fair game for the jackdaws, wood pigeons, Doves and magpies etc.

Hi,

I find this site useful for bird feeding supplies and advice.

http://www.awin1.com/cread.php?awinm...denbird.com%2F

Best of luck,

David