King of the Mountains

Summer has finally hit this corner of Wales, and in general seems to have been a popular move apart from those individuals who seem determined to show things the rest of us really don’t want to see. The birdies are responding well though.

Apart from one minor problem. It looks to be either a Speckled Thrush or Mistle Thrush, and it’s a thug.

I have seen it chasing crows twice its size across three gardens, and it was trying to kill our Blackbird until I intervened (screw Starfleet directives, that Blackbird has a family to support). It makes the most appalling racket to boot.

Interestingly it seems to have no quarrel with Wood Pigeons, which continue to coo and do regular impressions of a strangled French Horn. Whether a strangled French Horn would leave "deposits" all over the gate is a matter for conjecture, but the Pigeons definitely do. I can only assume that the Blackbird suffered the fate of many who stand up to a bully and then find that nobody is going to back them. Mind you, judging by the noise it’s currently making I suspect a repeat bout may have gone in favour of the yellow-beaked defender.

Sparrows. Lots of them, and most likely more to come. Once again they are looking at our guttering for nesting potential and a Beech hedge seems to have turned into the Sparrow version of a hot nightspot and pickup joint. Despite the bird feeder having been removed they still resemble feathered tennis balls.   

Inspired by a recent New Scientist piece I thought I’d write something about these intriguing creatures.

They have tentacles, funny eyes, and built in water-jet propulsion. What’s not to like? Added to this, research suggests that they are very intelligent indeed. Their camoflage in particular is incredible.

The cuttlefish can make itself invisible against all natural backgrounds, and will do a fine job when presented with man-made ones too. Witness one test when it was found that they would align themselves to stripes painted on the back of a tank. Horizontal stripes saw them lying flat, vertical saw them raising tentacles to blend in. They can even generate a moving pattern over their skin to distract prey and confuse predators. Of course, there’s always the famous cloud of ink as a last resort.

If you see one in an aquarium it will manage to look deeply thoughtful. While I somehow doubt it is considering the mysteries of the universe (other than where the next meal is) there is a fascination to them. Apparently they will often respond to divers making the "peace" sign by raising a couple of tentacles in a similar manner. While this is an alarm signal rather than a response in kind, it is still somewhat astonishing that a squishy tentacled thing can recognise and respond to humans. These little chaps (and chapesses, although I have no idea how to tell the difference) could well have been the dominant life-form on this planet had evolution taken a slightly different turn.   

Plus the baby ones are adorable. Look at those cute little tentacles! 

You can tell spring is approaching by the number of small feathered things in the garden. An update on the population.

Sparrows: Still plenty of them, still bouncing around making an incredible racket. After putting out fat balls all winter this is now a pretty good description of some of them. The future is bright for sparrowkind.

Starlings: Still making hostile take-overs of the bird feeders and bullying everything else. Oddly enough they never seem inclined to descend to ground level, possibly because of our next species

Blackbirds: The bouncing modem impressions continue. Still staring down the hyper-aggressive robins and fighting running battles with next doors.

Crows/Ravens: I have no idea which they are, corvid identification is not my field. However, they seem to have learned to perch on a nut feeder. That this does not lead to said feeder falling over is a great credit to the quality of materials used. Usually departs after a sharp hand clap, they are more than capable of finding their own food and are depriving smaller species.

Pigeons: Possibly collared doves. Either produces gentle cooing or a noise reminiscent of a strangled french horn. Their main contribution to the world seems to be to crap all over our new gates or provide entertainment as they try to take off. At least one of them is now approaching the size of a chicken. I have no idea what they are eating as they are completely the wrong shape to use our bird feeder and don’t seem to forage much beyond the odd exploratory amble around the lawn.

Red Kites: Are still to be found in large numbers a few miles away. One has been sighted overhead within the last week or so, suspicions that the blackbird went for it are as yet unconfirmed.

Pheasants: The strange startled clucking noises from the fields over the road have ceased. It may therefore be assumed that the random pheasant population has moved on.

The sparrow air force continues to dominate the garden. They have now moved into the "mass orgy" phase of operations and we will doubtless see hordes of young sparrows in a few weeks. They appear to regard the gutters as a sensible place to build a nest, the result being an impressive waterfall when it rains. As this is Wales, it does this regularly. The blackbird is still bouncing around chirping, and the robin is still trying to hide from the sparrow hordes.

The blackbird labours under the unappealing name Turdus merula. Hardly fair. These are some of the most characterful birds in any garden. Usually you’ll find that you have a breeding pair as they are very territorial. Ours seems to have a long-standing turf dispute with next door’s. Mostly this manifests itself as one perching on the garden wall and singing. The other will then dive-bomb the perching bird and chase it halfway to Scotland.

The individual bird studied appears to have very little fear of humans. Mowing the lawn will cause it to immediately swoop on the mown section in search of insects, where it will bounce around for hours in search of tasty morsels. Likewise it will make ear-splitting chattering sounds in a hedge right next to you. It also has the intriguing habit of perching in the top of the silver birch from whence it emits a variety of interesting whistles, chirps, and modem sound effects. Quite where it has picked these up from is something of a mystery, as modems are not commonly heard outdoors. 

The battle of the apple tree entered a climactic phase today, with repeated skirmishes from several guerilla groups.

Oh, ok, the sparrows seem to regard one of the apple trees as being of great strategic importance. Possibly this is due to the quantity of blossom on it, which must make for an eye-catching sight and provide good cover. Equally it could be the central location and ability to take off in any direction if attacked. Or it could just be that they’ve found somewhere safe to perch and chirp away merrily. The little chap perched on it responded to our reporter by emitting the usual song and then taking off like a SCUD missile. Further enquiries have been equally unsuccessful, especially as the researcher, while able to recognise a sparrow from, say, a car ferry, cannot recognise individual sparrows.

Tomorrow: The blackbird that perches in the top of the silver birch and does modem impressions. Or is it a car alarm? Or a steam train? Or a video recorder that just ate a tape? More to come from the battle of the birdies!

I’m currently over-run by small energetic feathered things

Those are the most numerous. We also get these, these, and varieties of these

And sometimes one of these. They seem to prefer open country though, so if you want to guarantee seeing one you need to go up into the hills.

A year ago, if you’d told me I’d be writing about our garden birds I’d have laughed. But they’re such wonderful characters. We have a blackbird that seems to have adopted the connection noises emitted by a computer modem as part of its call, and that bounces around the garden in the manner of a hyperactive spring. We have sparrows that seem to regard finding a perch that nobody else has thought of and announcing this to any passing female sparrows as the very meaning of existance. The robin barely gets a chance, even this fierce fighter backs down when confronted by a fluffed-up sparrow which is determined to keep possession of a bush, tree, or satellite dish.

There are the occasional bird-human encounters too. The sparrows seem to take great delight in perching on windowsills, which seems to provoke a mutal reaction of shock when they come eye to eye with a human looking out of said window. Likewise the particularly bold female sparrow sighted pulling material out of our hanging baskets for nesting purposes seemed a mite shocked when it found me watching interestedly from the kitchen window.

A national newspaper occasionally runs stories about the decline in the numbers of sparrows. All I can suggest is that they risk travelling to the frozen wasteland that they seem to consider to exist outside the M25. The sparrows, like many humans, have escaped to the country!