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Garden (Yard) Lists (1 Viewer)

Paul_Gower

Well-known member
Not sure if this should be here or in the Lists forum, but I would be interested in people's thoughts. Having not been much for keeping lists in the past, I decided recently to produce a garden list. This raises some interesting questions! For one thing, my "garden" is about 3 acres, some quite normal garden, other bits of copse and scrub - mixed deciduous trees, thorn, bramble, bracken etc. It is bordered by pasture land, with a stream 100 yds away, and woodland and common beyond.

Most of the birds on my list are "window ticks" but a few are not - the pheasant and the fieldfare in the orchard can't quite be seen from the kitchen window for example, and I haven't seen a chiff chaff or a goldcrest from the window althogh they are certainly to be found close to the house. And what about birds that fly over regularly but don't actually visit, like ravens, curlew, or gulls? Or swifts, which fly busily around in our "airspace" but don't nest here? I can count shell duck as a window tick because they graze on the hillside opposite, but they are not a garden bird! At night I can here lapwing in a nearby field and have seen them overhead - can I count them?

Does any of this matter?

Best wishes,

Paul
 
No, none of it actually matters. Just decide what your own rules are and keep to them.

I keep two lists: one of birds that have actually been in the garden and another of birds seen from the house, whether in the garden or not. For arial species I only count them if they look as if they are actually using the garden - e.g. I'd count a Sparrowhawk chasing a bird through the garden and Swallows/martins/Swifts making repeated passes through it (and thus presumably catching insects that have risen from the vegetation).
 
Dunno, 3 acres is verging on a 'patch' to me ;) but as Jason says, it's not important at all, there's no 'british standard' for these lists. Personally, I'd include all those seen on your property in one list, whether they were whilst walking about or from a window but it's totally up to you.

We all have our own rules, myself I have my main 'landed in garden' list and another for overflyers... so Red Kite and Little Egret get included but not on my main garden list.
regards,
Andy
 
Thanks - I like the idea of birds "using the garden" as opposed to those just passing over. This seems to say something interesting about the environment the householder has created etc. I take the point about it being more like a patch than a garden, but just about everything on what I think will be the "using-the-garden" list can be or has been seen in the immediate vicinity. If I went for the patch I would want to include the kingfisher on the stream below us, the curlews, lapwings and little egret in nearby fields, the snipe on the hill etc.

And of course I know size isn't important ;) , but depending on wihich approach I take the numbers vary a bit. Is there any rule of thumb about numbers of species to be expected in a given kind of habitat or area? You can date hedges by the number of species growing in them, which is not quite the same thing, but presumably some areas or habitats are richer than others?

Cheers,

Paul
 
I've got 40 acres which includes a garden, a wind break around the house and garden, a very long driveway, open fields, some woods and backs onto a tidal river. I keep a feeder list of birds that are on or around the feeders. Next comes a garden list which includes anything in the fruit trees or windbreak, along the driveway etc. Then there's a farm list which includes fly-overs or birds on the river at the back of the place, essentially anything that i can see from the farm. It all sounds complicated but in fact it's easy. I use Birder's Diary software and I've set it up so that anything that I add to the feeders list automatically gets added to the garden list, to the farm list, to the county list etc, etc.
 
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