Have you noticed any interesting birds behavior?

[midknight]

Hello. I have missed you so much and now I have been let out I thought I would post again. Love Robbie Xx

 

The other day I was in the back garden and was watching a group of some 10 sparrows and a starling on a roof of a house behind mine. In the gutter a starling was playing with a bit of fluff or something.

 

The sparrows sounded quite excited so I watched for a minute or so. The sparrows were mostly within 1 metre of the starling. Several times the starling hopped onto the roof near the gutter and the sparrows showed little sign of moving back. All of a sudden a sparrow flew in towards the roof from over my head (I think it was a female sparrow). She lunged at the starling, landing on its back and the pair fell off the roof towards the ground with the starling sqwarking madly. I could not see how far they fell but within a second the starling flew up to the house ridge and did not return to the gutter area.

 

Several of the sparrows went down into the rain water gutter for a while. I assume that there is a roost or old sparrow nest there. We have many hedges close by and the sparrows are by far the most common feeders at a feeder that we have in our front garden.

 

Last year I noticed a House sparrow chasing a Jackdaw for over 40 metres including 4 change of directions - quite a coincidence as the sparrow was less than a metre away from the Jackdaw.

[J9withdogs]

Hey Robbie..we've missed you!

 

I've got lots of sparrows in my garden due to having a large beech hedge on three sides and I watched them mobbing a blackbird a few weeks ago at the base of the birdfeeder.

 

It must be global warming...well, everything else is put down to that *-) (lol)

[Hymer C 9.]

Hi Robbie, good to have you back missed your posts, hope all is well with you now. Made me think and I have not seen many sparrows around us at all, will keep a eye out now for them. Carol.

[midknight]

Many thanks for your posts ladies. I lost my password quite a while ago and for some reason "they" would not send me another so I have just again as midknight not omidknight as before. I could only read posts and not post myself - sob sob.

 

I have just read a story in the daily mail online about a Magpie funeral.

 

There were 4 Magpies near a dead "friend". One of them went up to the corpse, gently pecked at it, and stepped back then another magpie did the same thing. One of the magpies flew off, and came back with some grass and put it by the corpse. Another magpie did the same and then all four stood vigil for a while and then one by one flew away.

[colin]

Magpies pair for life, so could have been 'the family'.

Glad you've got some sparrows, few and far between here, also sad to say I've had to stop feeding the green finches as they have a desease which is passed on at the feeders :-(

[josie gibblebucket]

Haven't seen any birds behaving strangely, but went to Thetford club site last weekend and saw a Kingfisher. I can't tell you how priviliged I felt. The colour was amazing, so vivid. He went as quickly as he appeared, but it made my weekend all the same. :-D

[Brock]

Birds in the garden can be quite stressful.

 

We had two pairs of nesting blackbirds. Despite being almost 20 yards apart, one pair in the back garden and one in the side gardedn, one pair attacked the other and drove them off. No eggs had been laid.

 

Then we had to sit and watch a magpie trash the other nest a few days later, eggs and all. Very upsetting. It might be nature but it's natural to put human feelings on animals you felt close to over the previous month or so.

 

I accidentially drove off the nesting building greenfinches by washing the van too often.

 

Most humorous sight was a few years ago when for days we watched a pair of tits feed a cuckoo chick. The chick would sit on the garden wall and devour all the mealworms the tits could bring from the bird table.

 

Most beautiful sight was the visit by two woodpeckers for a few weeks.

[avongas]

OOPs sorry - misunderstood the threads title!

 

:D

[kelly58]

I once saw a gay Sparrow fly backwards for a Lark http://www.outandaboutlive.co.uk/forums/images/emoticons/icon_redface.gif

[midknight]

Scientists reckon that the V shaped formation that Geese use when migrating serves two purposes-

 

One, it conserves energy as every bird flies slightly above the bird in front. This, results in less wind resistance. Also they take turns being in the front, and fall back when they get tired. Doing this the Geese can fly for longer before they stop for a rest.

 

Two, in the V formation it is easier to keep track of every bird in the group.

 

An 83 year old told me the Geese fly in a V for safety as they look like a huge bird.

 

Thanks Colin - after a little research we too have stopped using a bird feeder in the same place in our small garden. We now sprinkle some seed over a much wider area not in our garden. Was hard though, as a week has gone by and still the sparrows try to find the non existant bird feeder.

 

I have just read a story in the daily mail online about a Magpie funeral.

 

There were 4 Magpies near a dead "friend". One of them went up to the corpse, gently pecked at it, and stepped back then another magpie did the same thing. One of the magpies flew off, and came back with some grass and put it by the corpse. Another magpie did the same and then all four stood vigil for while and then one by one flew away.

[Usinmyknaus]

A keen observer of birds in the sixties, I used to take special note of the behaviour of Raquel Welch, Ursula Andress and Valerie Leon, but I'm too old and decrepit to bother now.

 

Bob ;-) :-D