Bird Issues!

Thursday was another wet and cool day although we had some weak sunshine late in the afternoon.

I think I know why our visiting kestrel was so contented yesterday as she sat in the magnolia tree. She was digesting her lunch.

I found these feathers by our puddle as I checked if anything needed watering in the greenhouse once the rain had stopped. There wasn't much left off whatever bird it was. 

Another issue is that our collared doves just can’t be content to take easy pickings from the bird table and the find a nice comfortable tree to perch in like the kestrel. Their first flight is to alight on my rain gauge and deposit their droppings into the measuring funnel. Then it’s off to find a suitable perch for digesting some seed. I can tell when the deposits are blocking the gauge as it indicates it’s still raining long after it’s stopped as the water slowly percolates through the droppings which accumulate in the bottom of the funnel.

This was the case yesterday, in fact water had stopped running through altogether so a good clear out was required.

So once cleaned out I decide to try to add some anti perching netting to the funnel. I’ve also seen blackbirds doing exactly the same as the collared doves so at the moment the gauge hasn’t been going very long between cleans. I hope I can now look forward to many hours of rain measurements without the need for such regularly cleaning out.