BirdForum is the net's largest birding community dedicated to wild birds and birding, and is absolutely FREE!

Register for an account to take part in lively discussions in the forum, post your pictures in the gallery and more.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Stephen Prower" data-source="post: 3584700" data-attributes="member: 115634">JoachimYou're kind!I'm not experienced, but spend a lot of time watching and photographing ordinary little garden birds in my garden. It's indeed often mystifying what's going on in their minds: Why they come one day, and don't come the next. Even the answers to more simple questions, not involving bird psychology, like: 'Am I viewing the same Goldfinches, or is it a succession of families from the New Town Centre flock?' to date defy me.In the case of the reaction of the birds in my garden to being looked at, it has to be a guess, but like Wood pigeons have a flight distance of 100 metres or more in the countryside, and sometimes 5 metres or less in town, I think the reason is a different association of a human being looking at them, or pointing something in their direction. From the look of some of the people on the street in my block of Stevenage New Town, I fancifully suspect that the association is airgunners firing at little birds in their gardens (Council-owned properties in the block have high panel garden fences, so that the neighbours are not going to complain about stray pellets). Certainly in complete contrast, away from the gardens, alongside one of the Stevenage cycle tracks a new sight this last year was a Buzzard with the flight distance of an urban Crow*: It was sitting on a 3 metre high lamp post about 5 metres away from me. I pointed the Buzzard out to a passing pedestrian; it just sat there calmly while we talked, and was still there when I continued on my journey.As you say, it's unfortunate we cannot ask them!Stephen* In the country also earlier this year, a Buzzard did even better. It was sitting on a low post at our level 2 or 3 metres to the side of a private road as a friend and I cycled slowly past; thought lazily about flying off; but by then we had passed it by; so it didn't bother. Totally Crow-like!</blockquote>

Verification