Avian Retribution
It’s a tough life for a blackbird in this neighbourhood…
This male blackbird relentlessly heckled this cat for three whole days, virtually non-stop…this is most likely the result of the cat killing a family member, usually a young bird…
In this case I think the unfortunate victim was the spouse as there is only one bird present…
The Feline Dilemna
For the last three and a half years I have been “catless”….meaning that I haven’t been under feline ownership. 😉
In these “catless” days I have taken to feeding the garden birds to an obsessive level…therefore my garden is an interesting place for my neighbours cats to visit…I have tried to keep them out but that would mean shutting out the local hedgehogs too…plus the fact that cats will always find a way…
These are the two main perpetrators in the disturbance of my avian paradise…I did build a bird table last year from bamboo as I thought that this may increase bird safety, yet I discovered that the table only created a blind spot which only aided feline offensives…these attacks eventually led to the destruction of the bird table too… 😕
The cats can’t help it, I know….even my lazy cat managed to catch an immature blackbird as well as several dragonflies, frogs and even a bat on one occasion 😦 …basically, it’s an impossibility fighting their natural instincts. The cat with the bell eventually lost his “cat-safe” collar…also it seems that I get more cats now because my garden is no longer the territory of a “home cat”…
Sparrow Psychology
For the last years I’ve fed the birds in my garden at ground level on a couple of paving stones as the area can flood if it rains a lot. All the birds can feed simultaneously, doves, pigeons, sparrows, blackbirds, greenfinches, chaffinches…plus the occasional visits from jackdaws, dunnocks and robins…
House sparrows are social feeders and like to descend on the available selection of seed and grain in large numbers like this…
Unfortunately when it rains the food can spoil rather quickly and then there’s the neighbours cat…
So after much thought (at least a year) I decided it was a good idea to construct a bird feeder….one that was easy to clean, keeps the food dry if it rains and safe from the claws of feline predators.
But it’s been a week already and the birds don’t even use it….only the occasional great tit and a pair of greenfinches…it seems to scare the sparrows and other birds…I still offer food on the ground closer to my dwelling and even right next to the new feeder, which probably doesn’t help matters but the pigeons have to eat too…I can’t imagine a wood pigeon using the feeder but the smaller collared doves might. I’m hoping they will get used it and not treat it like some obstacle…it also provides safety from hawk attacks…but until now my feathered friends refuse to cooperate. There again, the sparrows have been very busy lately, in the spring the tone of their chirps change…
Due to my rather excessive pruning of the privet hedge earlier in the year I was able to witness all their displays and quarrels…all this usually happens inside the hedge, my pruning provided me with a cross-section view into their world. Before you know it there appear small, fluffy bundles of joy, bawling for love….and food, maybe they should check out the new feeder. 😉
a heartical view 