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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Steve Dudley" data-source="post: 1700134" data-attributes="member: 5172">Coming late to this thread, but our garden similar to many who have posted. We've had standing snow and ice in the garden (N Cambs fens)  since 17 Dec. At that time we had around 150+ birds using the garden daily. Once the snow settled this trebled with major increases in Chaffinches, Greenfinches and Goldfinches in particular. Tree Sparrow actually went down (48 down to 35) but they normally all go walkabout for a a few weeks in Dec-Jan so guess some went but the rest stayed put.Obviously we've increased the amount of food we are putting out and when the weather was at its worst we were going through about 10kg of seed, nuts and suet pellets each day. Extra feeders were placed at each of the two main feeding stations and a third one was established in the back garden. The latter was an instant hit attracted 23+ Reed Buntings and 4 Yellowhammers - both species occ seen at the main feeding stations but always wary and obviously enjoy the new quieter more remote feeder position. Up to three Brambling is a record for us and a single Siskin on a couple of dates and up to 25 Blackbirds another record count.In the fields around the house all the passerines shipped out - Skylark, Linnet and Corn Bunting, and harriers and Merlin all followed (and Kestrel presumably at the lack of small mammals), leaving just the two coveys of Grey Partridge totaling 31 birds which seemed to spend most of their time sitting it out looking like lumps of mud in a ploughed field.  Interestingly, when the melt set in last week and about half the garden lost its snow covering, including the main feeding stations, numbers dropped overnight back to our 150 level. Bramblings disappeared, Reed Bunts down to just 4, Yammers went. I think this illustrates that birds do use such supplementary feeding as just that - food that supplements their natural diet. As soon as natural foods became available again the birds driven in to the garden by the cold spell went straight back out in to the wilds at the first opportunity. More snow today now means we have total ground cover again, but its the below freezing temps that are the killer. Lets see if the really low temps return and bring the birds back with them.</blockquote>

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