siskin – Donich Website https://www.donich.co.uk Argyll wildlife and nature as seen on the banks of the Donich Water Wed, 27 Jul 2016 19:56:10 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.7.4 Suddenly Chaffinches https://www.donich.co.uk/blog/2016/07/27/suddenly-chaffinches/ https://www.donich.co.uk/blog/2016/07/27/suddenly-chaffinches/#respond Wed, 27 Jul 2016 19:56:10 +0000 http://www.donich.co.uk/?p=5831 Since early summer, the normally prolific chaffinches had virtually disappeared on our bird feeders, and had been supplanted by huge numbers of siskins. For some reason, although they are a larger bird, the chaffinches seem rather scared of the little siskins.

Then this week, within the span of 48 hours, all the siskins have departed, and the chaffinches are back in force (nearly 100 of them feeding this afternoon). This is quite odd, as I don’t think siskins really migrate (although apparently they are more common in the south during the winter).

Anyway – much as I like the siskins they are terribly messy birds which drop so many seeds that last week I had to spend over an our cleaning the feeding area out. The chaffinches on the other hand eat every single seed and leave no mess at all.

We also have at least six immature jays at the moment. They are quite funny because they haven’t learned to be fearful yet, and this afternoon I was watching a pair of them trying (successfully) to raid the fat balls which are supposed to just be for the tits.

]]> https://www.donich.co.uk/blog/2016/07/27/suddenly-chaffinches/feed/ 0 Shy denizens of the Woodlands…. https://www.donich.co.uk/blog/2015/08/06/shy-denizens-of-the-woodlands/ https://www.donich.co.uk/blog/2015/08/06/shy-denizens-of-the-woodlands/#respond Thu, 06 Aug 2015 12:20:27 +0000 http://www.donich.co.uk/?p=4832 My bird book describes the Jay as a ‘shy woodland bird’. I just went into the kitchen and there were six immature but large jays around the feeding area; two were clinging to the fat balls we put out for the tits, and one was hanging from the bottom of the peanut feeder. Last year one worked out how to get the bottom off and extract all the contents in a oner – thank goodness they haven’t done that this year (yet).

Anyway there is going to be a big territorial battle soon I think because this lot are the second batch this summer and they surely all can’t stay in the one area. I only managed to get three of them in the picture (you have to click on it to see the other two).

Also on the bird front, in one of the strange shifts which seem to occur for no particular reason, the siskins have suddenly vanished but we seem to have a lot more assorted tits than a few weeks ago.

We also saw a buzzard being chased by a crow today, and the heron was back on the pond.

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