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

[Suffolkcoastal]

Have just got back into Bird Watching after many years, finding it a very relaxing hobby and an important part of my mental recovery. I used to do a lot of 20-25 years ago and saw many good and rare birds. Largely gave it up due to the very unpleasant and cliquey attitude of twitchers the Suffolk ones so annoyed me that I witheld my sightings of two Grey Phalaropes at Blythburgh and the biggest prize of all, a Black Woodpecker (not officially recorded in the UK), which I saw when preparing the wicket at my local cricket club in the north of Lowestoft. I had a good view of it and the flight call was what made me look up in the first place, big bird it was too much bigger than a Green Woodpecker. Hope to get out some more, with plenty of reserves in my neck of the woods and other sights I know of, this part of the UK is certainly a Bird Watchers heaven.

[ardcarp]

Good for you Suffolks. What a sight, the black woodpecker!

On the subject of cuckoos, they were recently quite abundant in the West Country, but have sadly declined very rapidly. A friend heard one the other day, but alas the Ardcarp family has not. They still seem pretty full-on in the Isles of Scilly...you even see them. But haven't made my pelerinage yet this year. I reckon the decline is more to do with what happens in their African wintering grounds than habitat/host problems over here.

[Nick Armstrong]

a Black Woodpecker

Crumbs.

I thought I was doing well in the Park the other day when in the sunshine on one of the trees just west of the Lancaster Gate entrance, there were sitting two plump bluejays and a green woodpecker. All very colourful and exotic-seeming compared with the standard issue monochrome pigeons and magpies...

[Suffolkcoastal]

I've heard and seen Cuckoos at all three reserves I've visited in the last couple of weeks, (Strumpshaw Fen, Carlton Marshes & Minsmere), but they have certainly declined in number. A number of other birds I used to see regularly are seemingly less common, like Greenfinch, Yellowhammer, Skylark & Meadow Pipit and I haven't seen a Marsh or Willow Tit for years.

[Dave2002]

Yesterday was accursed as one of the swallows which had seemed to be about to rebuild a nest which they last inhabited about 10 years ago flew into a window and broke its neck. Duly buried in the garden which has otherwise seen the return of willow warblers, garden warblers and blackcaps, all singing their heads off. The osprey which normally visits the pond on the neighbouring farm up to three times a day (stocked with trout and carp - or, at least, it was) not in evidence this year, alas.

Sorry to hear about the swallow.

Here is an article about birds colliding with windows, and it suggests that the problems mostly affect migrating birds - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-27426866

[Lento]

Lots of young starlings, first fledgling seen 9th May, a good ten days earlier than last year. Most of them have quietened down now. Great fun watching parents feed them with mild grated cheese! 3 young goldfinches being fed in a bush this morning: delightful.

[Suffolkcoastal]

Lovely late afternoon/early evening at Titchwell yesterday. Some good birds seen including, Spoonbill, Little Egret, Red Crested Pochard, Bearded Tit and Grey Plovers in breeding plumage. I've only seen the latter in winter before, when they are non-distinct, but in breeding plumage they are quite a stunning bird.

[Richard Tarleton]

Lovely late afternoon/early evening at Titchwell yesterday. Some good birds seen including, Spoonbill, Little Egret, Red Crested Pochard, Bearded Tit and Grey Plovers in breeding plumage. I've only seen the latter in winter before, when they are non-distinct, but in breeding plumage they are quite a stunning bird.

A great list, Suffy. I'm heading for Suffolk next month and hoping for some bird action between Aldeburgh concerts though the migrants will have all passed through by then. Your first three featured on my recent Mallorca list! Grey plovers in summer plumage are indeed stunning birds. I like the description of their posture in one of the bird books as "hunched, dejected", such anthropomorphic descriptions sometimes being quite helpful!

[Lento]

[QUOTE=SuffolkcoastalGrey Plovers in breeding plumage[/QUOTE]

I know they are called Grey Plovers, but it seems like a misnomer in the breeding season!

Youtube Slimbridge video link below; Grey Plovers at 4' 23".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bH0QTGbxP8s&list=UUQlb1STeXF0bnO74Kc9x9jw

[Suffolkcoastal]

Like that description RT and I can see exactly what they mean. There were also a couple of Golden Plovers with them and they provided a great contrast. Hoping to possibly pop over to Lakenheath tomorrow weather permitting. I like to get to any reserves around 3.30-4ish just as the numbers of birdwatchers are starting to drop, and stay till around 6-7.

[Dave2002]

Two woodpeckers today - one great spotted, most probably one which seems to come regularly, and a glimpse of a green woodpecker which got adventurous and was ground feeding close to our house, though it flew off quickly.

[mercia]

anyone watching the BBC Springwatch "live cams" on the Red Button (Freeview 301) ? though I have to say that looking at a Reed warbler sitting on a nest for several hours is a bit like watching paint dry.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

A pair of swallows/swifts/housemartins has made a nest on the (outside!) air vent of my study. They're chirruping at me quite contentedly as I write and seem to be enjoying the HM Lumieres box quite as much as I do. The very real joy their sound brings is slightly tempered by my concern that, if they bung up the air vent completely (which they haven't so far) will this create problems for the house? (They don't seem to be coming into the vent, just using the ridges as a platform to build their nest.)

[Anna]

Probably house martins ferney? I've just found that it's seen as a lucky bird perhaps because the martin has been viewed in the Christian faith as serving God, being God's 'bow and arrow'. Not so lucky if it does bung up your vents!

The other evening, after a heavy downpour, a woodpecker methodically going along the grass pecking and feeding, (actually quite a good thing I suppose as it aerates the grass as it goes?) Also, I notice a rare visitor (to my garden, not to others) of a bullfinch, so lovely and bright. The colony of sparrows are still very active nest building up under the tiles of the roof

[Richard Tarleton]

The other evening, after a heavy downpour, a woodpecker methodically going along the grass pecking and feeding

A green woodpecker, Anna? Regular ground feeders, especially ants. Sadly disappearing as a breeding species here in the extreme west of Wales.