Invitation to dinner - rejected!

Since the cold weather started in December, I've noticed a dramatic reduction in the number of birds visiting this suburban Cheshire garden.

In fact, in spite of seeds, nuts, home made fat-blocks, commercial fat balls, bacon rind, ham fat and granary bread being available there's scarce been an open beak to be seen.

The wild bird seed holder content has dropped an inch, out of it's 18 or so length, and yet at other times of the year it can be emptied in a day.

i'd have thought, with the snow and ice, that they'd be forming an orderly queue and booking time at the feeders - so where have they all gone?

  • Susan H said:

    And I echo Squirrel's comments about starlings being the big draw for other birds. This is very noticeable in my garden. It's like follow-me-leader when they arrive.

    We had that with our jackdaws.  The jackdaws arrived, then in no time the starling flock would be down (though they would often travel around together), and then everything else would appear!  The goldfinches would come bouncing over the rooftops to join the feast and then they'd all go lol

    I don't know whether it had something to do with the jackdaws nearly taking out one of the local cats lol  It seems that the starlings were the best at noticing the sparrowhawks too, they always seemed to be the first to react.