Since writing notes on our garden birds in February quite a few changes have occurred. The snow on 2 February brought a flurry of activity and many additional birds to our feeders. Two brambling, the only ones seen this year, two greenfinch, 12 chaffinch, nine goldfinch and 14 siskin, as well as all the usual residents.
On the 12 March we had our first visit of a sparrow hawk, which took a siskin from the feeder. It was back the following day and a pile of feathers beneath a tree indicated the demise of another siskin. On the 31t March we had another first when six lesser redpolls came and they stayed with us until 17 April. On 16 and 17 April we had a rare visit from a pair of stock doves. The last siskin was seen on 3 May. We put up nest boxes on 16 March and blue tits occupied one of them straight away. We think that they flew on 9 May as they had been feeding up to that date.
On a different note we had masses of frogspawn in our small pond on 2 May.
Chris Brading