Wildlife -January 2010

[mark smyth]

They sprrowhawk will have caught a slow or sick bird

Just had a blackcap pass through the garden. I'll go out and wedge an apple in the tree

[Richard Green]

Grrrrrr...... They are at it again this morning in broad daylight - this one was barely 10 meters from the house.  It is also after my Hebe bushes and has started on the Cornus in the background.  My neighbour is equally incensed and now has his rifle at the ready because they have raided the sprouts in his vegetable garden.

[Martinr]

Survival of the fittest among the birds in our garden is very appropriate as Darwin's grandfather(?) Erasmus Darwin is buried in thevillage. That's my useless fact of the day!

[mark smyth]

Here's a fieldfare in the garden today

[Stephenb]

Mark: Thought you'd like to see the distribution of overwintering Fieldfares in Scandinavia over this last week with temperatures under -30C in some places where they've been seen. Pretty hardy birds in other words - as long as there is food they survive these temperatures. I still have one in my garden too..

http://www.artportalen.se/fennoscandia_birds.asp?speciesid=612&year=2010&month=1

By the way, doesn't the UK have a similar reporting system? If not, why not (UK is renowned for having the greatest birdwatcher density in the world, I think?). We now have on-line reporting for everything from birds to mammals to insects, plants, fungi etc...

[mark smyth]

I'm not aware of one Stephen. That reporting sysytem you show is really good. Who inputs the details?

[mark smyth]

I've looked up many birds. There is always a large cluster of dots in southern Finland. Is there a bird clup there?

[Stephenb]

Ordinary people do - the worst errors are however removed! The Fennoscandia birds site is the only one that covers several Scandinavian countries so far - it gets its data from the national schemes: e.g., artportalen.se (Sweden) and artsobservasjoner.no (Norway). You can either enter your observations on a daily basis (it took a minute or so to enter today's observations in the garden) or you can just enter your observations on an Excel sheet and submit in that form when you have time. Many people are also putting in old observations. You can then search by place, by species, by time (year, month, day). It's easy for example to extract all observations made today in your area.  

[Stephenb]

I've looked up many birds. There is always a large cluster of dots in southern Finland. Is there a bird clup there?

That's where most people live...(probably Helsinki)

[mark smyth]

Thanks Stephen. Ill pass the web site link to birders I know

I would like to know why the fieldfare is known as a felt in N Ireland. Is it an Irish word, Paddy/Ashley/Michael?

What is it called across Europe?

[Michael J Campbell]

I have no idea Mark, it was always known as the Blue felt when I was young, and only in later years did we know it was also called a Fieldfare.

[angie]

Michael, lovely pictures of all your well fed and happy birds in your garden.

Mark nice to see that the fieldfare made it through the night.
Angie

[mark smyth]

If you have a beak use it
http://www.birdpix.nl/album_page.php?pic_id=197598&recent=1&db=0

[mark smyth]

and sometimes it gets you in trouble
http://www.birdpix.nl/album_page.php?pic_id=197471&recent=1&db=0

[mark smyth]

Here are some Dutch names for birds that are very similar to English names
Knobbelzwaan, Waterhoen, Waterral, Tjiftjaf, Fazant, Koperwiek, Buizerd, Roek, Boerenzwaluw,