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Garden / Yard List 2025 (4 Viewers)

Good point Ken , Brown Rat would be an unwelcome addition to the Garden mammals list.

Speaking of rodents, one of our photogenic residents (I’m guessing Yellow-necked Mouse) caused me a bit of a fright today. I fired up the Yeti for the first time in 5 days in order to take a relative to a hospital 40 kms away, chuffed that it started first time after these recent sub zero days. To cut a long story short, a strange odour which got stronger on our return trip prompted a look under the bonnet on getting back to said relative’s place, all looked OK but some liquid had leaked so I popped into our regular garage hoping they weren’t too busy to check it out. It was diesel fuel, and on lifting off the cover over the engine ( I hadn’t thought of that :unsure: ..) see what sight greeted us! Not only had ‘cute Mickey’ (as my wife has christened the mouse) made a cosy nest, he’d nibbled through one of the fuel pipes too! Not so cute after all!

Minnie Mouse “under a bonnet” is old hat…as you should know Richard.
Pity the mouse wasn’t present for the photoshoot!…you could’ve asked it to say cheese.🤣
 
Little Egrets are daily occurrences (the first today was heading straight at me as I drew back the bedroom curtains) but Grey Heron was new for the garden year on 12 January, dropping steeply towards the brook seen from my seat at the table where I do my photo stuff, internet browsing, Airfix etc....

Likewise a Common Gull circling with Herrings and Black-heads after being flushed by a Red Kite from the school field beyond the brook was no. 23 on 13 January.

John
 
My most likely new yeartick for the garden was #54 Mute Swan. If we hadn’t have had the river works blocking the entrance to our millstream, I’m sure I would have had one long before now.

IMG_4940.jpeg

I pondered over how it got into the garden last night, to roost, but it soon waddled into the stream, took a run up and flew out. I wouldn’t have thought it had enough space, but what do I know, I’m not a Swan.
 
The Water Rail seen again this afternoon, also fresh, as in last night, Otter prints by the front door. There seems to be a worn patch along the other side of our millstream, suggesting a frequently travelled route by these critters. A last minute pre-dusk wander around the garden, in a desperate hope of something flying over to roost, gave me a surprise singing #55 Treecreeper. Which is the total for an average January, an auspicious start to the year.

IMG_4944.jpeg

Roost dispersing Woodcocks have been seen just along the river, and I've had them here before, so I live in hope. Yesterday I went around the corner to see a flock of 45 Skylark, although I could only see 15 I did find a pair of Stonechat and a Reed Bunting - 450m as the bird flies from the corner of my patch. ☹️
 
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Yesterday a monthly guest (and summer breeder) fly over (actually there was at least 5)
#15. Common Gull

And also one Garden Lifer! 2025 garden Mammal no. 2. Least Weasel (just a fifth Mammal-species in this Garden in these 2,5 years that I have lived here)
Hopefully I see it again. It's so beautiful, especially now when it is pure white.
 
61. Goldcrest 62. Wren

Today is one of those “sunshine after the rain “ days where everything is brightly sunlit. Lovely detailed views of a colourful Long Legged Buzzard and separately a male Goshawk, both menacing the chicken flocks.
Nice to watch a Crag Martin in the sun too, little need for bins in this light.

Edit: Too quick to post- 63. Sardinian Warbler
Plus the usual Chiffchaff conundrum- usual brownish birds and one much brighter, yellower bird.
 
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#16. Herring Gull
#17. Bullfinch


Today I witnessed an event that I don't remember ever happening in the middle of winter. A Great Tit was bathing in a puddle! 😲 +5 Celsius here...
I find that no matter how cold it gets, if the water is there the birds will bathe, the other day the temperature barely reached 0° but when I broke the ice in the bird bath and refilled it two Blue Tits immediately came to use it, tough little blighters!
At a standstill in terms of additions since 8 January which is not usual, still today we had a very cute visitor below the feeders, it's taken 9 years but finally Nutkin has realised there's a fast food joint outside the forest!
 

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I find that no matter how cold it gets, if the water is there the birds will bathe, the other day the temperature barely reached 0° but when I broke the ice in the bird bath and refilled it two Blue Tits immediately came to use it, tough little blighters!
At a standstill in terms of additions since 8 January which is not usual, still today we had a very cute visitor below the feeders, it's taken 9 years but finally Nutkin has realised there's a fast food joint outside the forest!

I find that unfrozen water is as important as the seed feeders on -minus days.
I always put fresh water down irrespective, even if it’s already frozen!
As you say….Poeciles, Robins, Dunnock, Nuthatch, Blackbird, Song Thrush and even on occasion Wren seem to have a need.👍
 
I find that no matter how cold it gets, if the water is there the birds will bathe, the other day the temperature barely reached 0° but when I broke the ice in the bird bath and refilled it two Blue Tits immediately came to use it,
To a degree I suppose, but I can't see many birds bathing in the extreme colds of minus 20 and minus 30 that typify Finland and, more rarely, Lithuania - water would immediately freeze on the plumage and if the bird had ruffled to bath the under plumage I imagine it could be fatally cold
 
To a degree I suppose, but I can't see many birds bathing in the extreme colds of minus 20 and minus 30 that typify Finland and, more rarely, Lithuania - water would immediately freeze on the plumage and if the bird had ruffled to bath the under plumage I imagine it could be fatally cold
I never put water out in the winter, not only would it simply freeze most of the time, but birds don't need it - they eat snow
 
Lesser spotted Eagle, Yellow billed Kite, Red cheeked Cordon Bleu, Black bellied Firefinch, Blue spotted Wood Dove, Hadada, Lesser Honeyguide, African Paradise Flycatcher, Red faced Lovebird, Blue cheeked Bee-Eater, Sand Martin, Golden breasted Bunting, Eastern Grey Plantain Eater, Grey-backed Camaroptera, Northern Black Flycatcher, etc
(Temporary Ugandan garden List!)
 
Despite continuing mildness, a pretty good selection the assorted feeders - grain feeder area popular with Wild Boars overnight, but still attracting 100 Yellowhammers, while the house feeders now supporting 11 Tree Sparrows and about 25 Greenfinches, both very good numbers. Year additions included a morning flock of very nice snowy-headed Long-tailed Tits with a Treecreeper tagging along and, very unusual mid-winter, an afternoon arrival of two Hawfinches.

21. Long-tailed Tit
22. Treecreeper
23. Hawfinch
 
Despite continuing mildness, a pretty good selection the assorted feeders - grain feeder area popular with Wild Boars overnight, but still attracting 100 Yellowhammers, while the house feeders now supporting 11 Tree Sparrows and about 25 Greenfinches, both very good numbers. Year additions included a morning flock of very nice snowy-headed Long-tailed Tits with a Treecreeper tagging along and, very unusual mid-winter, an afternoon arrival of two Hawfinches.

21. Long-tailed Tit
22. Treecreeper
23. Hawfinch
Yikes Jos, I hope the Wild Boar around here don’t discover our feeders, we only have a few square mètres of ‘lawn’ and we’d like to keep it unploughed by les sangliers!
Up with the lark this morning (except we never see larks;)) at 04h50 as my wife was doing an early shift, I spent a good hour listening for owls -zilch. Still, a nice reward later on when at least three Black Grouse were on show across the valley having their breakfast of deep frozen birch buds.
Less exotic, but welcome nonetheless, the first

34 Starling

of the year, three feeding on the only unfrozen part of the fields down in the valley with thrushes. Between 2017 and 2022 I only had one January sighting of the species but today’s birds constitute the third year in a row that Starling have made an appearance in the first month.
 

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