The last couple of days haven’t been too bad. Sunday was much sunnier that Monday. There was a strongish breeze on Monday and the temperature, rather oddly, steadily increased throughout the day.
I saw this report about how many birds we have lost since 1966 and thought it was worth a closer look.
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I’ll start checking out our common garden birds just to see how they’re doing in the league tables of winners and losers. By far the easiest birds to start with in our garden are the goldfinches as they’re so easy to photograph happily feeding from the sunflower hearts just outside the window.
These brightly coloured little finches help themselves to sunflower hearts every day. The feeder is set to allow a maximum of three goldfinches at a time to stop the sparrows taking too much advantage.
So how are these little birds doing. Well the answer from the report is not too badly. In the period between 1970 and 2010 their population was up by 1.24 but conversely in the shorter term between 1995 and 2010 their population has decreased by a factor of 0.91. So I’d better keep on supplying them with sunflower hearts.
Their estimated population in Britain in 2009 was 1,200,000. Three years ago it was a rarity for us to see any goldfinches in the garden but since then a steady supply of niger seed and sunflower hearts has attracted them and now they are regular visitors.
You can download the full report from the RSPB’s web site here.
Copyright: Original post from Copyright: Original post from A Gardener's Weather Diary http://ossettweather.blogspot.co.uk/ author M Garrett
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Great photos of the finches. The one with three finches looks like a mirror has been placed near the feeder, as it's such a clear photo and the 3 birds seem to be mirroring each other.
ReplyDeleteI see what you mean but when there's 3 finches on the feeder they always perch equally spaced. If a 4th one arrives it starts off a squabble. It's difficult to get all three birds in focus at the same time. That pose of rolling the seed in their beaks is the best chance of getting them in focus.
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