What birds (are you/have you been) watching? What birds have been watching you?

[Vox Humana]

We have a flock of nine Long-tailed Tits that raids my mealworm basket two or three times every day. It's the first time we've had them visiting so predictably. Normally if there's a flock in the area it's just a single fleeting visit a day. Our Song Thrush has started singing from the wood across the road, but still drops into the garden early every morning. The Robin has started singing as well. The Blackbirds haven't shown any interest yet. Three times over the last couple of months Mrs Humana, who knows a little about birds, had reported a 'crest' in the garden and over the weekend I managed to see it myself. As I suspected, it was a Firecrest, which at this time of year is more likely than Goldcrest, though visits from either are very exceptional. As always with this species it came when the light was low and didn't hang around, so there was absolutely no hope of a photograph.

[Serial_Apologist]

We have a flock of nine Long-tailed Tits that raids my mealworm basket two or three times every day. It's the first time we've had them visiting so predictably. Normally if there's a flock in the area it's just a single fleeting visit a day. Our Song Thrush has started singing from the wood across the road, but still drops into the garden early every morning. The Robin has started singing as well. The Blackbirds haven't shown any interest yet. Three times over the last couple of months Mrs Humana, who knows a little about birds, had reported a 'crest' in the garden and over the weekend I managed to see it myself. As I suspected, it was a Firecrest, which at this time of year is more likely than Goldcrest, though visits from either are very exceptional. As always with this species it came when the light was low and didn't hang around, so there was absolutely no hope of a photograph.

Do the robins ever stop singing? One of the delights this last Christmas Day was being greeted by one such as I took my customary afternoon walk.

[Richard Tarleton]

Do the robins ever stop singing? One of the delights this last Christmas Day was being greeted by one such as I took my customary afternoon walk.

Females also sing territorially in winter, just to confuse things. David Lack's The Life of the Robin as good now as it was in the 1940s.

Here's a firecrest I took on 2 January - we do well for them hereabouts. But loads of goldcrests as well!

[ardcarp]

Fabulous pic, Richard. Is that a fig tree?

[Serial_Apologist]

Fabulous pic, Richard. Is that a fig tree?

Ivy?

[Richard Tarleton]

Ivy?

on sycamore if I remember rightly.

The only way to catch the little varmints, which flit about constantly, is to set your camera to burst mode, hope for the best, and be prepared for an awful lot of pictures of empty twigs for every firecrest captured. But they are stunning little birds. Feeding constantly on tiny insects, micro moth larvae, that sort of thing, which they find in the ivy.

[Bryn]

on sycamore if I remember rightly.

The only way to catch the little varmints, which flit about constantly, is to set your camera to burst mode, hope for the best, and be prepared for an awful lot of pictures of empty twigs for every firecrest captured. But they are stunning little birds. Feeding constantly on tiny insects, micro moth larvae, that sort of thing, which they find in the ivy.

Wonderful result, whatever the contribution of modern photographic technology. Did you sequence involve other frames where the Firecrest is in shot?

[ardcarp]

We've seen goldcrests a few times over the years but only once in our own garden. That's not to say they don't visit us, but being at the right spot at the right instant........

The bird we miss the most is the flycatcher. We had a pair which nested in our old wall for several years. We loved the way one would perch repeatedly on our beansticks before making a swoop...presumably to catch flies. Then they disappeared.

[Vox Humana]

The bird we miss the most is the flycatcher. We had a pair which nested in our old wall for several years. We loved the way one would perch repeatedly on our beansticks before making a swoop...presumably to catch flies. Then they disappeared.

Spotted Flycatchers are disappearing everywhere, it seems. I used to see them in our local woods, but haven't for many years now.

[jayne lee wilson]

On my usual walk last Monday....over 50 Fieldfares! They rose from the field chakk-chakking and alighted in the topmost twigs of the last copse before housing begins to encroach upon the wild....a few Redwings in among them....I've seen 4s and 5s before, never so many at once. A classic Winter Bird, never loses its poetry...

Last Monday? My last walk, house all topsy-turvy for the last few days with boiler, immersion, tank, radiator and pipe fitting.... given the age of the house I had to be here to advise......... I think all is well now, but taking nothing for granted yet....

Hope to get back to the woods and fields tomorrow....given the mildness the Fieldfares should have moved on....

[Richard Tarleton]

Wonderful result, whatever the contribution of modern photographic technology. Did you sequence involve other frames where the Firecrest is in shot?

About 75 on successive days, in the locality. Varying backgrounds and light conditions. They've become an obsession (there are 3 of them).

[Serial_Apologist]

On my usual walk last Monday....over 50 Fieldfares! They rose from the field chakk-chakking and alighted in the topmost twigs of the last copse before housing begins to encroach upon the wild....a few Redwings in among them....I've seen 4s and 5s before, never so many at once. A classic Winter Bird, never loses its poetry...

Last Monday? My last walk, house all topsy-turvy for the last few days with boiler, immersion, tank, radiator and pipe fitting.... given the age of the house I had to be here to advise......... I think all is well now, but taking nothing for granted yet....

Hope to get back to the woods and fields tomorrow....given the mildness the Fieldfares should have moved on....

Best of luck with all the plummery jayne - my upstairses have been undergoing a major refitting operation for 4 weeks now!

[Constantbee]

Females also sing territorially in winter, just to confuse things. David Lack's The Life of the Robin as good now as it was in the 1940s.

Here's a firecrest I took on 2 January - we do well for them hereabouts. But loads of goldcrests as well!

Super photo For anyone who's interested, the British Trust for Ornithology provides some helpful species identification videos on Youtube. Here's one for distinguishing between Firecrests and Goldcrests.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yofu093bPkw

It took me about 10 years to tell our Marsh Tits and Willow Tits apart, but with the help of the audio clips on the BTO site I identified the Marsh Tits' call quite quickly.

[Richard Tarleton]

Thank you! Yes those BTO videos are excellent, strongly recommended. Both marsh and willow have undergone declines/contractions in their breeding ranges - see the latest BTO Atlas.

I managed to squeeze off a couple of shots of goldcrest and firecrest in the same frame - tricky light conditions and they were both moving a lot but that's the firecrest on the left, you can just see a bit of his eyestripe. The goldcrest is glaring at him, clearly not happy with the situation.

[Vox Humana]

Excellent photos, Richard. The 'crest' video is excellent, although I would prefer to call the chest sides and upper mantle of the Firecrest 'bronze' rather than 'chestnut' because that's how they look in the field. Either way, it's an excellent mark to look for. I voice doing the commentary sounds familiar. If it's who I think it is, she is awesomely talented.