With the sun shining and its warmth now really tangible, I was out in the garden early this morning. The air was full of bird song; the robins declaring territories along with the dunnock, the high-pitched call of the goldcrest scouring the fir tree for food and the ‘Tee-cher’ call of the Great tit already prospecting my nest boxes! It even smelt of Spring today…. I’m not sure what that smell is, but I always love the feeling I get at this time of year… the promise of warmer weather, growth and new life.
For the first time this year, the frogs were active in the pond and I don’t think it will be long before I see spawn.
The siskin numbers have been increasing over the last week or so and there can now be 6-8 on the feeders. In 18 years, this is the first year I have ever had the stay for any length of time and I have never had more than one or two. They have started visiting the hub feeders at the other end of the garden and these are much more set up for photography. This morning the lovely sunlight allowed me a decent shutter speed and I was able to get the best pictures I have got so far of these gorgeous little finches….
There is a lot of bickering on the feeders between the siskins and the goldfinches and greenfinches…. this shot was taken when a greenfinch threatened to steal this siskin’s perch!
You can see the rest of my shots on my Flickr account. The goldfinches are visiting as well and they are looking stunning…
I also have a robin with no tail visiting… he has become very good at hanging from the fat feeders.
With my 2 very pregnant vixens visiting, I am keen to identify their earths, which I am sure are close by. I have struggled to locate their dens every year! I have located two possible sites and I have put trail cams on both sites today…
I will check them tomorrow. I am pretty sure the top one is being used… not so sure about the bottom one. It would be great to identify the dens before the cubs are born and hopefully document their first peeps into the big wide world in about 6 weeks or so…