New bird for the garden if not for the list... Jay.

A Eurasian Jay visited our table today for the first time. Strangely though, it was intimidated by a Wood Pigeon that was occupying the table when it arrived and only came to feed when the pigeon had gone.

The Wood Pigeon that stopped the Jay visiting the feeder until...

... it had gone. A great treat to see this attractive bird close up.

The Jay sat for some time on the fence and ate from some small piles of food we had placed on the fence posts.

It also visited the covered table but was chased off by a Jackdaws. It may be a flashy bird, but certainly not aggressive or ebullient.

The CommonWhitethroat also visited today singing for all it was worth, in the drizzle, right outside our window.

This Whitethroat has a very tatty tail now.

Blue Tits have occupied both our nest boxes now. In the one we put up when we moved in in March we only noticed birds coming and going for the first time yesterday but today we saw the adult emerge with a faecal sac so they must have been there for some time unnoticed by us.

Rather soggy looking Blue Tit.

Great Tits, although not nesting in the garden, are coming and going frequently, so look like they have young too somewhere nearby.

Shame about the reflection on the window glass.

The local Robins have done OK too with two young birds visiting the garden feeders.

Juvenile Robin

The number of Collared Doves has increased since they found the garden, and that number includes some young birds with little or no visible collar.

Adult Collared Dove

Juvenile Collared Dove with virtually no neck ring.

There was also this bird that appeared briefly today which seems to be much ruddier in colour than the other Collared Doves and its legs are a deeper pink.

Ruddy hued Collared Dove.

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New bird number 51 (and 52 & 53)

To the background of our now resident Whitethroat I glanced out of the window across the field towards the lake. Yesterday, the farmer had decided that he needed to cut down a number of the willows that blocked our view of the water. I'm not sure how I feel about cutting down trees at this time of year, but the clear benefit is that straight away I can now add Great crested Grebe to The Cottage list!

It is now just a matter of time until Tufted Duck and Coot which both frequent the lake hit the list.

Great Crested Grebe; obviously not the birds we can see from the cottage. Elis has a good lens, but not that good!

When we moved in our neighbours, who also love their birds, told us they had a list of 60 species. We thought this was exciting but we didn't realise just how birdy our garden was to become and coupled with our view, which has just 'improved' from a listing point of view, I believe we will soon overtake our friends' garden list.

Stop Press! Since writing this another day has dawned and with it, the sighting of a Coot and a Tufted Duck as predicted.

Tufted Duck; comment as per grebes above.

Eurasian Coot; ditto.

Got the Whitethroat I wished for!

Back from the Norfolk Bird Fair and sitting in my usual spot I saw a small bird flit up from the oil seed rape to the brambles beneath our window where we saw both the Blackcap and Sedge Warbler previously; henceforth this spot will be known as the warbler window. It then sang, revealing itself to be a Whitethroat!

Our first Whitethroat.

It seemed to be gleaning a lot of food morsels from the underside of the stinging nettles.

The list has now moved on to 50, with other additions being Lesser Black-backed Gull, Pheasant and Collared Dove which finally put in an appearance.

Here are some more photos of some garden stuff.

After the young Starlings the other day we have now been visited by this jaunty little Robin. The Blue Tits should be out of the nestbox soon too judging by the racket they are making.

The old 'shufflewing' continues to hurl himself at the window periodically.

Great Spotted Woodpecker. We finally got a visit from this lady's mate, but weren't quick enough for a photo.

Another stunner in the cottage garden.

On the blower to my mate David Lindo, better known as The Urban Birder, talking about Wader Quest business, he being a Trustee and all that, I saw a female Bullfinch sitting on the fence. David must have wondered what the hell was going on as I dropped the phone and shouted to Elis to get her camera and we then spent the next two minutes ooohing and ahhing at this bird and her fine looking mate.

Female Bullfinch arrives near the feeders.

They didn't stop very long; the female appeared to collect some nesting material and they were gone. I then remembered I was supposed to be having a conversation with a rather bewildered Mr Lindo, sorry about that David but I'm sure you understand how it is.

Female Bullfinch on the lawn (that looks more like a meadow in truth!).

Although it only stayed one day the Sedge Warbler singing outside our window was quite a treat, whatever will we get next? Whitethroat perhaps? Here's hoping!

Sedge Warbler singing just outside our window.

We have now also added fly-by House Martin and the first screaming Swifts, summer is really here, cant wait to see what tomorrow brings! Cottage total now 46.

Not sure when we'll get another of these, if ever, so I'm making the most of this one!

Garden tick, but not a bird...

What do you call a day that starts with finding a badger in your garden? A good day, that's what!

Badger digging up our garden!

And making its getaway!

Elis and I went to a car boot today to raise money through the Wader Quest mobile charity shop for our charity project. It was great fun and we did reasonably well all things considered.

The mobile charity shop.

Birdwise in the garden recently, we had been reasonably expecting a few more birds to turn up for the list since it is spingtime. One was pretty well predicted, another only a matter of time but the third a real surprise.

The expected bird was Swallow. They have bred in the past in the garages that were once stables and we hoped that they would return, in any case we thought it likely we would see one of these summer birds at some satge. Well today we did, a swallow swooped over the stable block. we will now have to leave the door open in the hope that they'll nest again this year.

Barn Swallow, not our bird but one we saw a few days ago in Wolverton. Photo: Elis Simpson.

The second bird was Black-headed Gull, as said, inevitable one day with a lake at the bottom of the field, it was a single bird in breeding plumage.

No photo of the Black-headed Gull, instead a Eurasian Blackbird with a beak full of worms.

One afternoon my son and I were gazing out across the field watching his frriends plodding about among the oil seed rape when I heard the unmistakable sound of piping oystercatchers. I scanned but could see none on the ground, then Martin, my son, pointed to three birds in flight. It was the oystercatchers. I watched them circling around calling until one of the birds peeled off and flew strongly west and away, the remaining two circled slowly down and I have reason to believe they may be forming a territory down by the lake. As a wader lover this is a very unexpected and pleasing addition to our cottage list.

Guess what? You guessed it, no decent photo, so... Greenfinch instead.

We have also had a bit of fun with a Dunnock. This chap has taken to sitting on our windowsill singing to himself in the window's reflection and occasionally pecking at himself. Once or twice he flung himself at the glass, but soon learned this was a fool's errand.

Ok, not the demented Dunnock, a Robin instead.

I still spend much time gazing skywards in the hope of seeing our first swift.

Obviously no swift picture; Eurasian Jackdaw.

An odd pair of tits

That title should get my hits up a bit! But seriously though has anyone else noticed pairs of mixed tit species going around together? We have a perfectly bog standard pair of Blue Tits using an old dilapidated nest box that has seen better days on the end of the garage block. They have been collecting nesting material for some time now. We also have a splendid pair of Great Tits that come regularly to the feeders and confound us with their multitude of different songs and calls.

Blue Tit gathering nesting material

However we also have a pairing of a Great Tit and a Blue Tit. these two birds are inseparable, where one goes the other is sure to follow. They will forage together through the Ribes bush, fly off together into the surrounding trees and appear again, always together. We've not seen any kind of pairing or mating behaviour to be honest, they just seem to be good mates, very odd.

The odd couple

This reminds me of the unusual pair of tits at Hanson Educational Study Centre in Newport Pagnell. We have often been there to look for the Willow Tit, which again almost invariably appears with a Marsh Tit. Last year we wondered if they had formed a pair and mused as to what we would call the offspring, would they be Wish Tits or Mallow Tits?
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Marsh, Willow, Wish or Mallow Tit?

Here's the other one!

Cottage list update.

The garden list has grown somewhat since Wader Quest gave me a breather and therefore the chance to do a blog here, we now boast 37 species.

On of the most bizarre birds we have seen has been a pair of Red-legged Partridges. Now it wouldn't have been that unusual if we were to report we saw them from the cottage window overlooking the fields, but these birds were in our garden, which has got a dirty great brick wall all around it! They ended up scuttling up the path between the houses and presumably that is the way they came in.

Red-legged Partridge among the primroses in the flower bed!

At the bottom of the field, where the Swans are usually seen, from time to time we get geese leaving the lake and sitting around in the grass, both Greylag and Canada Goose have now been added to the list. The swans though are presumably nesting somewhere as they seem to have stopped visiting the part of the field that we can see, although a walk down there the other day revealed that there is in fact two pairs.

Common Buzzard enjoys the spring sunshine

A couple of times we have seen Little Egrets flying near the lakes. It still seems mighty strange to be putting Little Egret on my garden list, along with Red Kite when I think of the lengths I had to go to to see them for the first time in the UK many years ago.

Woodpigeon collecting nesting material

A single Kestrel hovering over the field is the only one-off sighting we have had of this species, but I expect we'll see him again. Great Spotted Woodpeckers have visited the feeders a couple of times but we have yet to get a photo of one. This is the first time I have ever had these terrific birds on any feeder I have owned, a great feeling especially as we also get the Green Woodpecker on the lawn from time to time.

Green and Goldfinches, colourful regulars

Three birds that I have heard but not yet seen are Skylark, Chiff Chaff and Blackcap, one of which has sung a couple of times nearby. Another bird that I had only previously heard has now shown itself, a Song Thrush visited the area under our feeders one day but has not yet returned, however he has taken to singing much closer to the cottage now.

Song Thrush caught as he was leaving.

We have had a couple of short stay visitors. The shortest was a Lesser Redpoll that stayed just one day and a Reed Bunting that stayed for a few days. The Marsh Tit seems to have moved on too as we haven't seen it for some time.

Lesser Redpoll on its single day of visiting.

Reed Bunting stopped by for a few days.

There are still some birds that I am amazed we haven't seen, House Sparrow, at least one pair no more than 100 yards away but never ventured into sight, and Collared Doves. The estate has them, we see them every time we go out, but they have not yet appeared here. Just a matter of time I suspect, after all the Starlings have now found us, as has a perishing squirrel!