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The woodpecker visited the garden to feed on the suet block today.  That didn't please the moorhen who is skulking about on the grass.

 

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I went for a walk the other day fairly near where I live and saw a starling murmuration above the fields - it is a few years since I have seen one.

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I did my Big Garden Bird Watch for the RSPB earlier.  The scene was quite lively with a flock of little blue tits darting around.  The moorhen turned up, a couple of magpies, several wood pigeons, the robin and the blackbirds. :)

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Have you watched a kestrel in hunting mode? We see them quite often especially along the motorways they hover for ages then fold their wings and dive! 

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That's a beautiful woodpecker you have there Mz Terry !  I think we have garden birdwatch here too, I don't have a garden (there is a tiny grassy patch in the car park but it doesn't get much on it) but if it's nice tomorrow I might try the local park where I have had firecrest before now. 

 

Here's a picture from my mini-adventure today (in the spoiler because it came out a bit big).  There's a lot of saltmarsh between Narbonne and the Spanish/Catalan border, it's not as famous as the Camargue (Rhone delta) but has similarly very cool stuff on it.  I've been through on the train lots of times, as the main railway line all along the south coast and down to Barcelona runs along a causeway between the lagoons, but today was the first time I've got off at one of the (tiny) stations and had a poke about.  It was well worth it, so I think over the next few weeks I might try some of the others on the same route...

 

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Greater Flamingos -- pink adults and grey juveniles.  They're resident here so will stick around all through the winter.

 

 

and teatree -- thanks for the kind words :)  I have much better recall of language than images, so my aim is to find words to describe precisely what I see and want to remember.  It's lovely when it works out !

 

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Did the Birdwatch here and was very pleased that three goldfinches turned up!  Also, my favourite the Robin :), a couple of sparrows, starlings, woodpigeons..

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My new house has a suet box/cage. There had been a suet block in it, but recently I noticed it was all gone so I got a new one when I was at a store yesterday. I haven't seen any birds at it yet, but I'm sure some will show up eventually. Previously I had seen various songbirds and jays at it at various times.

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Guest Jetsun Milarepa

What a great thread! Lovely pics . It's encouraging to hear about wildlife, where I live right now doesn't have anything exotic, but in spring and summer there are loads of toads and frogs about, and a little hedgehog comes to the garden at night. Sometimes the starlings put on an aerial show, but mainly it's blackbirds and sparrows.

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Autumn Sunrise

I'd love to have a visiting hedgehog - or perhaps it would have to be an echidna, but they're very shy. We do have lots of frogs, and in warm weather we often see a few attached to the clerestory window above the living room door: they wait for the little moths that fly near the glass when the light's on inside, and I guess they usually end up with a pretty good feed - they're very quick! We also get tiny bats inside from time to time. They're really cute, but very difficult to coax back outside - they just don't seem to get it, and it can take ages of strategically opening some doors and shutting others, and orchestrating lights on and off, before they finally find the outside door and disappear into the night :D

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Apparently we have a deer problem where I live.  Some people are feeding them because of the harsh winter.  But feeding them encourages them to hang around and eat domestic shrubbery. Also, Mule deer have very sensitive stomachs and can die if the food is too rich or just the wrong food.  They need to eat woody shrubs and dead grass this time of the year.  Recently the city polled its residents through the monthly water bills and asked if there should be laws preventing the feeding of deer within city limits.  the results were 435 in favor of feeding and 298 who opposed it and thought there should be an ordinance prohibiting deer feeding.  One neighborhood has over 100 Mule deer roaming about.   They haven't been too bad in my neighborhood, although in prior years they were so common that my dog quit barking when they visited.  Here is a picture from today's newspaper:

 

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I just finished looking through all the amazing photos in this thread. I will post some at another time. 

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Snowdrop pics from today.  The sun has made them open.  These are from my garden.  The ones in the vase have a sweet scent, and I believe are the variety Sam Arnott.  A friend gave me them from her garden several years ago.  The ones in the pot were from a garden open to the public that grow many snowdrops, and sell different varieties.  They are similar to the others but have a clearer, darker green marking but no scent.  The differences in snowdrops are subtle and train the eye for detail. 

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Thanks for sharing those snowdrop photos, @Mz Terry.  They look like some kind of tropical lily - I have never seen a flower like that before.  And they just grow wild all over England this time of the year?

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@Muledeer  Yes, they do.  They especially love old churchyards and some woodland.  They are probably not native but were planted at some point in gardens, the bulbs having been brought back from abroad.  They have naturalised to the point of becoming a wild flower here and are amongst our first plants to flower in early Spring/late Winter, along with the little cyclamen coum.  The early crocus follow on.  Neither of those garden plants have naturalised like the snowdrop.

 

Picture taken today in an old churchyard.

 

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I have crocus and daffodils in my garden - a few are in bud at the moment - they will be coming out with this mild weather we are having :)

Was on my way to the garden centre this morning to buy some snowdrops 'in the green'.  Unfortunately a drunk/drugged driver crashed into the bus so I never got there!

This spring I want to dig a tiny pond in my garden as even a small pond is supposed to be good for wildlife - it will have to be small as the garden is pretty small....

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I love daffodils - soon as we get them in the store, I've GOT to buy some. Customers I speak to say the same thing (as I think) - they're a sign winter is over :) 

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@Blackthorn The accident sounds nasty.  I hope no one was injured.  Were you on the bus, or did it happen earlier on the route?

 

The pond idea is excellent.  I installed a pond here, and put in a few goldfish (netted to protect them from the heron) and in next to no time there were frogs, and there are tadpoles each spring.  There are also newts, and dragonflies.

 

I had a good day out bird watching, and saw marsh harriers and short-eared owls amongst other species, and thousands of waders - knot, lapwing, golden plover and oyster catchers.  We also saw a brown hare.

 

Pic of happy bird watchers against a setting sun, and the big sky of the marshland.

 

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My house has a little pond (artificial), with running water (some sort of pump, I think)

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4 hours ago, daveb said:

My house has a little pond (artificial), with running water (some sort of pump, I think)

Artificial water features like ponds and aquariums can either be a source of joy and entertainment, or they can be a maintenance nightmare, depending on how you view them.  Personally, I see them as something that needs constant attention and upkeep.   Maybe I could change my mind if I ever actually had a water feature and used it.  I have a very large pond shell that someone gave me about ten years ago and it has never held water.:huh:  

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Just now, Muledeer said:

Artificial water features like ponds and aquariums can either be a source of joy and entertainment, or they can be a maintenance nightmare, depending on how you view them.  Personally, I see them as something that needs constant attention and upkeep.   Maybe I could change my mind if I ever actually had a water feature and used it.  I have a very large pond shell that someone gave me about ten years ago and it has never held water.:huh:  

Edit: I have enjoyed keeping fountains because they make nice splashing sounds and you don't have to keep anything alive in them.

 

And I have no idea why this edit became a quote

 

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3 hours ago, Muledeer said:

Artificial water features like ponds

I haven't put any living creatures in mine and don't plan to, if that makes any difference. So far, I haven't had to do any maintenance. If it becomes a chore I can always remove it. :)

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We used to have a small artificial pond in my backyard. My mom was too cheap to put in any sort of aeration system so my fish kept dying. I also used to find drowned birds in it which would really upset me. After a couple of years we took it out.  

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I saw the year's first butterfly yesterday.  A male Brimstone flying in Winchester yesterday. It's very early especially as we had snow on the ground a week ago 

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I saw the year's first mosquito yesterday.  Not as thrilling as your butterfly, but still it was the earliest I have ever seen a mosquito around here.

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