Santa's birds arrive

I know that Christmas is coming because, this week, my garden has been playing host to some birds that come from Santa's homeland. (I know there's some dispute about where Santa lives, but as far as I'm concerned it is northern Scandinavia).

They arrived on a grizzly dark winter's day, perching up high in my myrtle tree. I wouldn't normally post rubbish photos, but the reality is that this is how we often see birds in winter, half silhouetted in the murk. But even so, you can probably make out their big pale eyebrow and strongly streaked breast.

Many of you will already have spotted that they are Redwings,and I admit to having an incredibly soft spot for them, these slender, rather nervous wanderers from Iceland, Scandinavia and Siberia.

They can appear rather misnamed - they look like they should be called the 'Redside', but the red, as well as being along the flanks, also extends across the front half of the underwing.

The dark feathers are a deeper chocolate colour than Song Thrush, and the breast streaking is also bolder on a paler ground colour. They really are rather handsome.

And what gives an excellent extra clue are their calls: they give a drawn-out, thin 'tseeeee', and a soft 'huc....huc'.

In my garden, they have been eagerly stripping a large Holly tree of berries, but today a few came down to the grass, and even headed to bathe in the pond.

With the forecast for cold weather and wintry showers for several days and maybe for the next few weeks, I'm predicting more and more of these, and their cousins the Fieldfare, will descend on gardens looking for berries and fruit. The Redwings in my garden may be ignoring the windfall apples I've put out on the lawn at the moment, but I think they'll be ever so glad of them soon.