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Having become alarmed over the last couple of years at the decline of some of the birds we used to take for granted, Mrs Goodman and I have of late taken to observing some of the weirder looking ones that turn up at the Birdtable.
We have all the usual, Robins, Bluetits, Blackbirds, we've been pleased to see the return of a solitary sparrow, no sign of Thrushes, got a Woodpecker, then of course the menace Magpies that get chased off along with Seagulls and Crows, but this one had us looking on the web, it sort of looks Chaffinchesque but not quite like all the illustrations seem to indicate, so where else should we turn for the definitive answer but here..
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Any ideas what it is?
Greater spotted woodpecker.
The significant red blaze on the head identifies male or female but I can't remember which way round.
Male greater spotted woodpecker, unless there's something I've missed.
Males have a red mark on the back of the neck, juveniles have a red cap.
did he post the correct picture?
the menace Magpies that get chased off along with Seagulls and Crows
They are all wild birds, you know.
Oops sorry wrong section, can it get moved?
Woodpecker? yes but it's green, so you reckon this is one as well, so there must be a pair then, would a red one mate with a green one then, bit of a colour clash that..
mtbfix - Member
the menace Magpies that get chased off along with Seagulls and Crows
They are all wild birds, you know.
Yes, but.. Seaguls are a bloody nuisance always have been and they are not welcome. Mrs Goodman is convinced the Magpies are the reason we don't have as many of what we used to know as common birds, Thrush, Sparrows, and compared to the dawn chorus we used to know when we first moved in, it's fairly low key these days.
Don't even talk about Crows, they are the spawn of satan.
Woodpecker? yes but it's green, so you reckon this is one as well, so there must be a pair then, would a red one mate with a green one then, bit of a colour clash that..
Bill Oddie would be throwing tantrum at this . . . lol 😀
No. The green one is an ermm Green Woodpecker.
Nice that you get both in the garden. The Greater Spotted tends to feed on the feeder whereas the green one probably prefers feeding on the lawn?
Green woodpeckers are green, black woodpeckers are black and greater spotted woodpeckers are spotty but bigger than lesser spotted woodpeckers.
They don't interbreed in much the same way that red footed and blue footed boobies don't make sweet love to produce purple footed boobies.
Mmmm..... Boobies
If you get green woodpeckers you're v lucky, they're not very common, but more so than the lesser spotted
http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/birdguide/families/woodpeckers.aspx
Freester - Member
No. The green one is an ermm Green Woodpecker.Nice that you get both in the garden. The Greater Spotted tends to feed on the feeder whereas the green one probably prefers feeding on the lawn?
Yes exactly how did you know that?
I do so hope you're not the reason my dearest has developed this interest in birdwatching of late..
hang on how did you even know I had a lawn...[/paranoia]
Is this a genius troll? Can we get a picture of the chaffinch this looks like?
Yes exactly how did you know that?
'Coz that's what they do and I occasionally get both in my garden.
I do so hope you're not the reason my dearest has developed this interest in birdwatching of late..
😉
hang on how did you even know I had a lawn...[/paranoia]
mwah hah haw haw
Feeling bad about being a mocky, encourage the woodpecker in a month he'll likely bring the young to the nuts, park him in a near by tree and then get bits of nut and take them to him. Later you get to watch the young one try to land of the feeder, greaty comedy value.
You want to be careful encouraging juveniles to feed on your nuts and posting about it ont 'net
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According to that a chaffinch is marginally biggerer
How big are bullfinches? I must only be seeing the drones around the garden, the Queen is enormous!
these are refusing to leave the garden ! 😕
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that chart is not to scale, a greater spotted woodpecker is four or five times the size of a blue tit
Thanks for that Terry Nutkins
A few years back I had a Woodpecker as a regular visitor. The local Blue Tits weren't impressed:
[url= http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7260/6988826146_428c4fceac.jp g" target="_blank">
[url= http://www.flickr.com/photos/egg_n_bacon/6988826146/ ]Woodpecker on bird feeder[/url] by [url= http://www.flickr.com/people/egg_n_bacon/ ]jwrfooo[/url], on Flickr
It was me that guessed chaffinch, my only experience of bird and bird watching was boy scout stuff eons ago so, I looked up chaffinch and it looked sort of similar except the red was the wrong end and given we already had a woodpecker and it was green, you wouldn't have expected it..
I should add, this is only a recent interest for all the reasons cited in the intro, and yes if you think it's a troll then truly I'm a genius and only took that picture precisely to troll cyclists on an internet forum.. 🙄
Anyway thanks to those in the know I can now go home ce soir with the news we now have two types of Woodpecker, which won't go down well since we've already lost a fine weeping ash at the hands of woodpeckers over the years, maybe it's them that are the pests.
So, what do the jury think about magpies? Time was if you saw one, you'd salute and ask how it's merry wife is today or some similar, now it's not uncommon to see 8 or 9 in the field (we cal it a field it's not, it's just too big to be a called a lawn and the male of the species expected to mow it continually, it's just a big bit of grass and often full of magpies, or rabbits).
[i]A few years back I had a Woodpecker as a regular visitor. The local Blue Tits weren't impressed:[/i]
it's not surprising Woodpecker will take juvenile bluetits.
I can't see a green woodpecker in that picture ^^.
Bullfinches are quite big, larger than most other finches.
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That's what our woodpecker looks like, so now we have two and if Klunk is correct then that could also be a reason for the general depletion of 'ordinary' birds, we'd blamed the Magpies..
Lovely.
Green woodpeckers are normally shy birds and mostly feed on the ground, so you were lucky to get one in your garden.
@Klunk - that's a male Reed Bunting. Not sure if you were looking for an ID?
We're lucky enough to have 29 bird species visit our garden:
Blackcap (1 pair?)
Blackbirds
Blue Tits
Chaffinch (2 pairs?)
Chickens (fly grazing?)
Coal Tit
Collared Doves
Feral Pigeon
Great Tits
Greenfinches
Green Woodpeckers (3 together, a family?)
Goldcrest
Goldfinches
Gulls
Jay
Red-legged Partridges (1 pair)
Pheasant
Robins (1 pair?)
Rooks (1 pair?)
Siskins (at least one family)
Starlings
Sparrow
Sparrowhawk
Thrush
Long Tailed Tit
Magpie
2 x Mallard Duck families with (13 ducklings total)
Moorhen (on hedge then climbing tree)
Wood Pigeons (innumerable)
Plus the occasional Muntjac (or Muntjac family), squirrels, & hedgehogs.
And yes, ordinary house, ordinary area, surrounded on back and both sides by other proprieties.
Great Spotted Woodpeckers don't usually have an "er" in the Great.
See Black Woodpeckers around here from time to time (sometimes in pairs).
Black Redstarts seem to be quite common too (see some at work, and some seem to nest pretty close by at home too).
Still need to identify some yellowish kind of bird, that's kind of chaffinch sized.
Well we're not quite ready for a [url= http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_year ]Big Year[/url] just yet, but since we literally are the last house on the edge of town so semi rural, we really ought to be experiencing the joy of more birds than we currently are.
We only got into it recently when I bought a bird table after using this place for free parking whilst visiting the dinghy show then feeling guilty, and noticing that we haven't been woken at five in the morning with the dawn chorus like we used to and there have been one or two items in the press about it, so first hand observation is obviously the best way to enlightenment.
We've had ducks, pheasants (we're next to a big estate where they breed them to shoot), heron (nicked the fish out of our pond)wood pigeons, crows, rooks (not sure which is which, but we have had two distinctively different types, one last night the head of which looked duck like), but we're missing Thrushes, Sparrows, Starlings, Wrens, that used to be so common you took them for granted.
I also keep my eye out when riding and don't see them much either, then again we never used to see woodpeckers which were kind of a big deal when they first showed up.
Why has no-one said baby robin yet?
nice list Tucker i'm surprised no dunnock, fieldfare, bullfinch or Jackdaw though.
rarest we've had is a summer visit from a Brambling.
Ive had 3 bramblings regularly since xmas 🙂
My garden bird list includes tawny owl and kingfisher, very proud 🙂
However one guy trumps all that, 2 Christmas's ago, a stw'er (cant remember who, but was from bristol) had a long staying water rail in his garden. He had photo proof too. That is poss the best garden tick ive heard of, other thsn a dead corncrake turning up in a hampshire garden.
we had some black caps in our garden once, years ago, in the winter, but unusual...
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Ive had 3 bramblings regularly since xmas
winter bramblings are as common as muck.
Well not really!
saw a Barn owl on a post at the side of the road the other day, such a beautiful bird
Definitely, ive been birding all over the world for 20 years, and seen some amazing birds, and yet the sight of a barn owl, is still as fantastic as it was 20 years ago as a yoof.
Blackcaps have started to become more frequent garden visitors over the last couple of years, as have siskins.
Our local blackcap was singing for a mate the other day.
Excited to see our first swallows last Sunday.
Managed to see a little owl and a snipe on a local mtb ride 2 weeks ago, very nice.
Yeah, we have blackcaps daily in my garden, I did the rspb blackcap survey a few months ago, and ours behave totally wrong apparently! They are meant to be very aggressive within the garden bird community, yet ours are very stand offish and submissive, even with blue tits.
I find the natural world fasinating, how can a bird spend weeks rearing a chick, with total devotion, and then push it off a cliff, for no apparent reason?
Still need to identify some yellowish kind of bird, that's kind of chaffinch sized.
Yellowhammer?
Plenty of Blackcaps out the back of our garden because it's quite scrubby which is great for wildlife and some birds like Blackcap, Nightingale and others as it's untouched.
Trouble is that increasing Deer population like to clear up the scrub.
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