07 Thursday Mar 2019
Posted in 365DaysWildin2019, birds, nature
Tags
#365DaysWild, Being woken by a blackbird singing, birding, birdwatching, blackbird, Blackbird singing, British birds
Actually, my Blackbird’s not been singing in the dead of night but just after six most mornings, and it’s getting earlier as the days grow longer. Soon, I shall probably be cursing it but for now I love being woken up by the dulcet tones of a Blackbird’s song.
25 Friday Jan 2019
Posted in 365DaysWildin2019, birds, nature
This was such fun that I have not one but six photos for you today. As part of my walk from Roath Park via Bute Park to central Cardiff, I was wandering around Cathays Cemetery when I spotted this male Blackbird. He was using a water-filled urn on a grave, and his enjoyment of his bath was so wonderful to see that I was actually laughing out loud watching him. I hope these images make you smile as much as I was.
23 Wednesday Jan 2019
Posted in 365DaysWildin2019, birds, nature, plants
Tags
birding, birdwatching, blackbird, blackbird eating berries, British birds, Penarth marina, Pyracantha berries
Four Blackbirds, three males and a female, are currently sharing the colourful and obviously delicious (to Blackbirds) bounty of these Pyracantha bushes in Penarth Marina. Nom, nom, nom!
07 Saturday Jul 2018
Tags
bird behaviour, bird sunbathing, birding, birdwatching, blackbird, British birds, Bute Park, sunbathing bird
I spotted this Blackbird during a wander along the woodland trail in Cardiff’s Bute Park today, and it was concentrating so hard on its sunbathing that it didn’t notice me at first.
The sun was fierce, which I think accounts for the bird sitting with its mouth open, trying to cool itself down. As for the sunbathing itself, here’s the explanation from the British Trust for Ornithology website:
‘Sunbathing’ is used by some birds as part of their routine feather maintenance and is most commonly seen … in Blackbirds and Robins. The birds invariably adopt a posture in which the body feathers are fluffed up and one or both wings are held out from the body, with feathers spread. It is thought that using the sun in this way does two things. It both helps the preen oil to spread across the feathers and drives parasites out from within the plumage. Some of these parasites feed on the feathers themselves and all are highly specialised, with many only found on a single species of bird.
05 Thursday Jul 2018
Tags
birding, birdwatching, blackbird, British birds, bullfinch, Carrion crow, Collared dove, garden birds, Goldfinch, Great spotted woodpecker, Woodpigeon
My friend Sharon has a lovely garden: an area of lawn bordered by flowers, shrubs and hedge; a separate area for growing vegies, the glasshouse and the beehives; and a lovely little bit of wild woodland at the end. It’s a paradise for birds, particularly because Sharon also has lots of feeders that she keeps stocked up with seeds of various kinds and suet blocks. As a person who lives in a first-floor flat with no garden, I just love visiting Sharon’s garden. I could sit watching the birds all day long.
My photos show just a few of the birds that entertained us yesterday – and these 14 species are not the only birds that visit: House sparrow, Blue tit, Great tit, Collared dove, Woodpigeon, Chaffinch, Goldfinch, Bullfinch, Carrion crow, Great spotted woodpecker, Magpie, Robin, Dunnock, and Blackbird.
The Great spotted woodpeckers have been bringing their offspring to the garden this year
The Woodpigeon doesn’t look too happy about the Carrion crow being so close
A Blackbird with an odd beak
‘This is ours’, squawked the Goldfinch to the Bullfinch, but …
… the Bullfinch won out on the day!
A beautiful Collared dove
14 Wednesday Mar 2018
Tags
#WildWords, birding, birdwatching, blackbird, leucism, leucistic, leucistic blackbird, wild words
Leucistic: Adjective; (of an animal) [or other creature] having whitish fur, plumage, or skin due to a lack of pigment (Oxford Dictionary).
It’s not easy being different as this leucistic black-and-white Blackbird seems to be discovering. I’ve spotted it several times in and around a neighbour’s backyard in recent days, usually sitting alone, looking a little bereft. Once it tried to approach first a male and then a female Blackbird, adopting the submissive posture a young bird would adopt to beg food from its parents, but the other birds totally rejected it and flew off.
I’ve posted about leucistic birds before: a Crow here, and a Jackdaw was the star here.
01 Thursday Feb 2018
Tags
birding, birdwatching, blackbird, British birds, chaffinch, coal tit, Common Gull, Cosmeston, Cosmeston Lakes Country Park, Gadwall, Great tit, long-tailed tit, Marsh tit, nuthatch, Pochard, Reed bunting, robin, shoveler
7 January Gale-force winds were blasting across the exposed areas around the lake today but, with blue skies overhead, the park was full of people out walking, despite the chill. The wee birds were hungry and I was greeted with much happy peeping wherever I scattered seed and virtually mobbed at the dragon tree in Cogan Woods, by Great, Blue, Coal and Long-tailed tits, Dunnocks and Robins, Chaffinches and Nuthatches, Blackbirds and a Reed bunting were all happy to accept any tasty little morsels.
On the lakes the birds were mostly hunkered down, as it was too windy for flying. Teal, Gadwall, Pochard and a Shoveler were some of the highlights.
17 January After much scrutinising of the huge numbers of gulls that you nearly always find at Cosmeston, I spotted my first Common gull of the year.
23 January A regular Cosmeston-going birding friend had reported an adult Yellow-legged gull the previous day and I fancied a good walk so I headed to Cossie for a look. These was no sign of the gull but I was delighted to see one of the Marsh tits that frequents a particular spot in Cogan Woods, and it became bird number 67 on this year’s list, before I strode quickly home in pouring rain (yep, drenched!).
I’ve been to Cosmeston a couple more times this month but those outings were more about braving the rain to satisfy my cravings for fresh air and exercise than nature-watching, particularly as it’s been too wet to have camera and binoculars out and about. Let’s hope February is a bit drier.
23 Saturday Dec 2017
Tags
birding birdwatching, birds in culture, birds in society, blackbird, British birds, Turdus merula
This is not a pie recipe! This is a visual celebration of one of our most common birds; one that almost every person can recognise and name; one that loves to sing its happy tune in our gardens and parks. There have been songs entitled ‘Blackbird’ (the Beatles, 1968 song, for example); films and plays, books, poems and short stories (too numerous to mention); people with the Blackbird surname; places named Blackbird (in England and the United States); planes, yachts and locomotives with the Blackbird name; even sports teams and personal computers (Hewlett Packard’s Blackbird 002). What a contribution this humble bird has made to the world!
12 Tuesday Dec 2017
Tags
birding, birdwatching, blackbird, Brambling, British birds, Carrion crow, dunnock, Great spotted woodpecker, house sparrow, Nant Fawr, Nant Fawr Woodlands, Song thrush, walk in the woods
There was snow on the hills north of Cardiff on Saturday morning so I thought I’d try to get closer to take some photos but also combine that with a good walk. So, I jumped on a train and went a’stomping. Unfortunately, by the time I got closer, the snow had mostly melted away, which wasn’t helped by the fact that the footpath I had intended to follow, along the eastern side of the Llanishen and Lisvane reservoirs, was closed. So, I contented myself with a wander through the Nant Fawr woodlands and, afterwards, a circuit of Roath Park Lake.
I was rewarded with the sight, albeit distant, of my very first Brambling – my shots are heavily cropped so you’ll just have to take my word for it!
A small group of House sparrows was dotting about in bushes at the woodland edge.
I always thought Carrion crows were mostly solitary birds but this flock of about 20 proved me wrong.
The wood-tapping of this Great spotted woodpecker helped direct my lens in its direction, as did the singing of this little Dunnock.
And Song thrushes and Blackbirds were enjoying a hearty lunch of berries along the hedgerows.
19 Thursday Jan 2017
Tags
berries, birding, birdwatching, blackbird, British birds, Cotoneaster berries, Redwing, Roath Park, winter berries for birds, Woodpigeon
They may look luscious and juicy but Cotoneaster berries contain toxins, which means that many people consider them poisonous. (There’s a good article about whether or not they really are poisonous on the Poison Garden website.) Yet the blackbirds, thrushes and woodpigeons seem to enjoy them and, when the more desirable berries like rowan have been consumed, these nutritious berries help to sustain the birds through the lean winter months.
Roath Park has several cotoneaster trees that are covered in bright red and dull yellow berries at the moment so, as I walked home from the train station this afternoon I kept an eye out for feeding birds. And I got lucky.
The hefty woodpigeons were easy to spot as their clambering made the branches shake a lot. The blackbirds were more delicate but also more entertaining, as they performed their aerial trapeze, clinging to branches and stretching as far sideways or upside down as they could to reach the furthest fruit. The bonus of the day was a group of about five redwings also feeding spasmodically in these trees. They were more skittish, flitting quickly on to the very top branches for some rapid pecking but, always watchful, flitting away again to higher nearby trees as people walked past along the pathway.
earthstar 
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