Snow driving this weekend!

Well the weather meant I was at home all weekend (like a lot of folks I guess!), I had a small paiting job to do on Saturday and had time to fit in some photography in the garden in my 1 man bird hide especially when I saw a Brambling again in the garden from an upstairs window between coats of paint!

Saturday March 23rd
I positioned myself in the hide so I was able to scan the tree at the bottom of my garden and the feeding area too. I was bloody cold but good fun and very active with around 20 Lesser Redpolls and the odd Siskins (2 pairs) calling in with the Chaffinches and small group of Goldies, Collared Doves, Wood Pigeons and even a lone Rook  and not forgetting the Brambling too! Below are a few images from the saturday session in the hide 😉
The nervy and shy Brambling, it only came into the garden a couple of times when enough Chaffinches were there to support it!
Garden regulars Collared Doves, waiting their turn to feed.

I tried to get some Lesser Redpoll images that did not show the feeders they seem to adore in my garden, this was the best shot of the day in that regard.

The occasional visitor, Rook, somebody loves it somewhere!

Less regular but still seen pretty often Siskin we usually get 4 but can get up to 8, lovely sight to see at any time in my opinion.

Sunday March 24th
While Karen was starting to watch the GP I thought ok a little more time out in the hide to see if I could get any better shots of the Brambling if it was still around.

First was the usual high count of Lesser redpolls, 23 highest today 🙂 then a Blackbird hen appeared from its nest site inside the round Camilia bush in our garden, photo below …I had spread a good handfull of sunflower hearts on top of the new snow to see what could be attracted down to feed. Then not long after this the Chaffinches began to drop in, 2 then 4 then about 10 and in with this last number the Brambling Yes! got a few shots off before it went off back into the tree at the bottom my garden, the bird came into feed only once more all day but spent a lot of time in the tree tucked in the middle. Photo of the Brambling which I initially thought was a male the day before can be seen below along with one of its Chaffinch companions …

The Siskins came to feed pretty close to where I was and I managed a few shots, 1 each of male and female of this delightful species below, the male is rung too! …In the afternoon the sun made an appearance and so I moved the hide to a better positon to make best use of the light and focused on trying to get some decent head shots of the many Lesser Redpolls to be able to show the massive visual differences that can be found in this wonderful bird, 4 of 15 shots I achieved below …

Note: Some of the 4 images above have had the feeder cloned out of them to make the image more pleasing.

Now I know some folk poo poo this garden birding but when it is like what I am experiencing at the moment in my garden what else can you do? – What would you do?