Hi! New to birdwatching: live at Finsbury Park (2 Viewers)

[Guilhem37]

After watching an interesting documentary on common birds and having a couple of Great Tits nesting 1m away from my kitchen window, I developed a sudden passion for common birds 1month ago and here I am: hi everybody!

So here's my question: at what time of the day can you see the broadest range of birds in London? (I'm more interested into variety and opportunities than looking for one specific bird)

I know what is recommended, dawn and dusk, but it's not what I'm observing and I wasted several sessions done too late during the day, but maybe it's me?
My experience is that birds are quite active/visible before 10am (before too many people woke up). After 10/11am, you need to move to more isolated places. Starting from 6/7pm, it's getting more and more quiet and difficult to find a lot of birds. Ok you have a lot of Carion Crows gathering, Black Birds singing and Common Swifts eating insects, but globally, dusk doesn't look like the right time to me. So I don't understand why it is recommended to go birding at dusk? Today I just wasted my time from 8pm to 9.30pm at Alexandra Park to see pretty much nothing.

Places I went to (I'm using the GoBird smartapp)
Gillespie Park, Woodberry Down Reservoir, Finsbury Park, Clisshold Park, Waterlow Park, Alexandra Park, Abney Park, Richmond Park, Lee Valley from Hackney to Totenham, Totteridge Valley/Darklands Lake, Hampstead Heath
(I want to explore Cheshunt, and go back to Richmond Park and Totteridge Valley that I overlooked at dusk)

 

[KC Foggin]

Hi there and a warm welcome to you from those of us on staff here at BirdForum :t:

Hopefully, someone from your side of the pond will respond to your question.

We're glad you found us and thanks for taking a moment to say hello. Please join in wherever you like

 

[Kits]

Welcome to Birdforum! I am sure that you will find lots to interest you here and I hope that you enjoy your visits.

I think early morning is probably the best time.

 

[Guilhem37]

Thank you to both of you for your warm welcome
Yes, I think morning is the best.
It's 10am here, I'm on my way to Gillespie Park.
I'm going to check a range of sites very quickly, to confirm the timing.
Woke up a bit too late though

 

[delia todd]

Hi Guilhem and a warm welcome from me too.

As the crow flies, many years ago, I used to live not too far from you, in Belsize Park! Though I wasn't deeply into birdwatching in those day, just nature in general.

Try and find spots near water, these will give you a greater variety of species, not just on the water, but in the surrounding shrubs and trees.

Hearing the birds is a great help, so to go out when there's little traffic noise will give you the best chances of locking onto where the birds are hanging out. They are usually less active around mid-day, especially when it's hot. But there's another feeding frenzy just before dusk, to see them through the hours of darkness.

Hope this helps - see if you can get hold of the book The Urban Birder by David Lindo. He's a Londoner too.

I'm sure you will enjoy it here and I hope to hear about all the birds you see when out and about.

 

[ClarkWGriswold]

Hi Guilhem and welcome to BirdForum.

Rich

 

[Guilhem37]

Hi, thank you guys
In the middle of birding, will give a longer response later Delia.
At Woodberry Reservoir/New River path: I jsaw a blackcap (was hoping to see this one for a while, finally!) and a Great Cormorant fishing in the river 2-3m away from me, amazing!

 

[Guilhem37]

Amazing start at Woodberry
Just to let you know, London Wildlife Trust needs donations as the Covid killed the income they need to maintain the Woodberry reserve (I gave them 5£, better than nothing I suppose but times are hard: you just need to text WOODBERRY at 70085 to donate 10£).

Yes Delia, I noticed that ponds attract birds. I check for ponds and rivers with Google maps when exploring a new area
I'll have a look at the book you mentioned when the bookstores reopen. I was also interested by this one: "RSPB Handbook of British Birds": I would like to have a book that describes in great details all the birds of UK, in the manner of Wikipedia articles but of higher quality. What motivates me in birds is to understand the way they live, their behaviour and mentality; if it was just about watching nice birds, I wouldn't have started this

On my way to Alexandra Park, last stop for me today

 

[delia todd]

I'm glad you had a good session out this morning Guilhem.

We have some excellent articles in our Opus section on all the birds of the world. For instance this is the one on the Great Tit. All the articles are written and edited by members here.

If you also search for, say, London, you will find some articles of places to visit in the London area, though others you may have to search by county. There's a tab at the top for this section.

The book that's most recommended is the Collins Bird Guide, which covers all of Europe, though some of the RSPB ones are good too, covering for the UK only, so likely to be of more assistance to you as there'll be less birds in them to confuse you at this early stage.

 

[Guilhem37]

Thank you, I'll definitely have a look!

 

[Guilhem37]

Article: yes that's true Great Tits can be aggressive: I just saw one attacking a blue tit at Alexandra Park

 

[Guilhem37]

Turned out I was out all the day long and I saw a Red Kite flying at the Totteridge Valley =)

 

[delia todd]

Red Kite: wonderful... that would be a red-letter day for me here.

I'm glad you enjoyed your day out Guilhem

 

[Guilhem37]

I finally saw a Chaffinch

Does someone know which bird is singing in this video I recorded plz?
https://youtu.be/1sVq4eYirr4

I thought it was a Song Thrush (or a Nightingale maybe).

 

[Arbu]

I finally saw a Chaffinch

Does someone know which bird is singing in this video I recorded plz?
https://youtu.be/1sVq4eYirr4

I thought it was a Song Thrush (or a Nightingale maybe).

Yes, song thrush I think. Maybe a blackbird in there too.

I went for a swim at the West Reservoir near you last week and saw a sparrowhawk, little egret and a fox, and heard a reed warbler. You could try that (if you like swimming. You can't get in otherwise!).

 

[Guilhem37]

Thx, I wouldn't see anything without my glasses