For WHO's birders

[Nurse Ratched]

"I thought you might like this video.



It's a compilation of different birds singing. Beautiful photography. If you expand the 'title' under the video it gives a list of species and the times they pop up in the video. Most of the species are familiar to us in the UK, but there are some 'exotics' (the cranes - wow, what a noise!) It was filmed in Belarus. The guy has a channel you can subscribe to. Anyway, I hope you enjoy it and maybe it'll take your mind off you-know-what for a few blessed minutes."

[Nurse Ratched]

Here is a clip of a hooded crow cockblocking a tom cat. Made me guffaw. https://youtu.be/sKh63xVFllM

[the exile]

"Just seen my first swallows and house martins of the season - Wye Valley. Must have been at least 30 of them, all flying around above a sewage works near the river. Plenty of bugs for them there I suppose. Hope the weather warms up for them soon."

[Hammer and Pickle]

"Saw a bumblebee yesterday, another couple of skylarks and a redstart today."

[WHU(Exeter)]

"This question might have been asked on here before, but what's happened to ladybirds? Saw one in my garden today but it's a long time since noticing one before. Seemed to be far more commonplace when I was a kid. Ditto caterpillars now I come to think of it. And those little red dot things..."

[WHU(Exeter)]

"had one flower from one geranium last all winter, red one. I think things like that are brilliant. Geraniums have now become my second favourite flower after cornflowers."

[zebthecat]

"The Jackdaws have decided to nest in my disused chimney again at last. There was a very vocal fight between three of them to take posession. Watching them fledge last year was such a pleasure and I hope that they make it that far again. It is quite fun as there is an air brick at the back of the living room that ventilates the chimney and I can here them. They also have to put up with my music taste, guitar, synth and sax playing. Not sure that is a fair deal but it worked last yearfor us all."

[zebthecat]

gph 2:52 Sun Mar 21 Drakes are far from the comical characters they appear to be. I remember the gay nechrophiliac duck story. Also look carefully at the male/female Mallard ratio as the years ticks on into Autumn. That tells its own story.

[gph]

"I ran over a squirrel with my bike. I was crawling along in my car when a drake (probably too busy contemplating his next rape*) stepped out in front of me. Probably didn't even go under the wheel (no blood left on it when I got home), just knocked over and got up again. *see the literature on duck sex."

[Tomshardware]

I've been divebombed by wrens before now that had a nest inside a shed above the door.

[Nurse Ratched]

"York University doesn't have a problem with ducks, however, since you murdered them all with your bicycle."

[gph]

"York University has got a problem with geese. One year, a student who lives in a ground-floor room likes geese, and feeds them bread and stuff. The next year, a student who is terrified of geese lives in the same room, and they come knocking, after they've been to Canada and back."

[Tomshardware]

"WHU Exeter, I have also seen that weird dance they do, at the time I wasn't sure if it was a cock bird trying to impress a female or as you say a war dance, either way it's one of funniest things I've seen."

[Aalborg Hammer]

"My Mum would put raisins and sultanas out at the same time every day and a pair of blackbirds would appear..one morning she was late putting them out and they were pecking on the kitchen window,cheeky bastards!"

[WHU(Exeter)]

"Crassus, almost got to that point years back, there was a robin where if I was putting food into the feeder it would stay just a a very few inches from me without any concern whatsoever. Couple more weeks and reckon I'd have been able to do that feeding from my hand, but then the season changed and his visits stopped."

[Crassus]

"My wife does the facebook thing, she is continually showing me clips from a site she follows about robins feeding from hand Apparently they get used to you feeding them and the method is to put the seed in the hand of an extended arm and they come down to feed End up waiting and then just jumping on like a budgie - easy to train them they say"

[zebthecat]

I have loads and loads of sparrows. They wash in the gutters of my house and are the background noise outside as they are so chatty all the time. They also have very little fear of me now unlike the other birds especially just in the back garden. There is a hedge on the left as soon as I step out and as long as I am about 6 feet away they are quite happy to do their thing without flying off in a panic. It is definitelay Robin argument season - there was one perched on last year's bamboo tomato wall support singing his head off at another in an a apple tree and he was about three feet away from me and not remotely bothered. Probably too rapt insulting the other Robin.

[WHU(Exeter)]

*food in parts of the garden*

[WHU(Exeter)]

"Tomshardware....a few years ago we had a robin visit our arden everyday and I'd leave it parts of the garden near the kitchen that the other birds wouldn't venture to, he used to come pretty much the exact time every day (a lot of birds seem to do that, can set your watch to them) Another robin came along one day and the resident one did this little war dance, spinning around like he was powered by clockwork, it was cartoonish but really lovely to watch."

[Crassus]

"Geeps, I'll leave you with the penises, and raise you are rare old display of bollox - which causes me something a of a quandary We back on to open fields, so are used to an influx of rodents post harvest, which goes with the territory, mice and voles Recently the dogs have been acting irregularly and there has been suspicious consumption from the monkey nut feeder - today, it was confirmed, bastard rat sighted But events took a turn, a bloody great rat, size of a Jack Russel, hoovering up beneath the feeders, when a magpie sprung from the shrubbery, unhappy with the rodent intrusion - a stand off, followed by an off The pecking mag hopping and leaping and a startled rodent bobbing, weaving and posturing, culminated in the rat rushing at the bird and jumping at it, mag had it on it's toes and retreated, the buggers were not playing either Good job there was not a Paddy Power on it, I would have lost, the mag was carrying my wager and support. Funny enough, I was not the lone spectator, my mates the finches, tits and sparrows were chirruping and bouncing all around the 'Colosseum' So now, I have to bring in the exterminator and curtail the feeders, which is a bugger in the current season and the regular attendees that I have courted And all along the hounds were taking zzzz's in the house"

[gph]

"Birds are careless. The most primitive species have penises*, but the more derived ones have lost theirs. *strictly speaking, penis-like organs, which may not be erected by using blood, and may only have a groove rather than an enclosed tube to carry semen"

[gph]

"Birds are careless. The most primitive species have penises*, but the more derived ones have lost theirs. *strictly speaking, penis-like organs, which may not be erected by using blood, and may only have a groove rather than an enclosed tube to carry semen"

[Tomshardware]

Greenfinch are suffering from some disease sadly. Long while since I saw one.

[Fo the Communist]

"exile Indeed, mate. Hopefully its natural ebbs and flows of populations but I wouldn't count on it given habitat loss. As I frequently say, to general indifference, if you really want to look at a body that genuinely affects the world around you, then look no further than your local planning authority. Decisions made by those have far more impact on your day to day life and wellbeing than other more topical organisational bete noirs."

[the exile]

"Fo - it's curious how the different finches have fared over the years. When I was a kid, 50 - 60 years ago, goldfinches were pretty rare but greenfinches and bullfinches were dead common. Bullfinches are particularly scarce - I have only seen a couple in the last 15 - 20 years."

[Fo the Communist]

"Ah Crass, proper little players for sure, the robins. Not bird related but while we are waxing bucolic, I saw two adders the week before last while walking on the downs. I hadn't seen one (never mind two) of those for decades."