BIRDS OF MANY FEATHERS ALL DINING TOGETHER

After a week of glorious weather, a sunshiny dry spell with some people complaining that it's too hot up in the 30s (not me), the rain has come and it's very welcome too.  The rain has saved me a job by watering my garden and at the same time has put nitrogen into the soil.  You can almost see the plants sitting up and begging for more.  The birds seem to like to visit and feed when the rain is like a fine mist.  On my bird-feeding station (I can see it from my desktop computer) there are so many different types flitting back and forth, reaping what they did not sow: sunflower seeds.  I've seen Coal Tits, Blue Tits, Sparrows, Greenfinches, Robins, Thrushes, Chaffinches, and what I thought was a Bullfinch, but I am wondering where the Goldfinches are.  Hang on, a blackbird has just arrived and is kindly picking up bits of seeds which the greedy small birds have dropped. Good.

Goldfinches, 2016

A lady at a garden centre told me that she was troubled with slugs eating her garden plants and that she was always putting down slug bait.  I told her that I encouraged birds into my garden and that although I do find slugs often enough, there are not so many that they are problematic and I assume that is because birds like a little variety in their diet and not just seeds all the time.  I often see birds that prefer to, or are happy to, ground feed (Blackbirds, Robins, Collared Doves, Sparrows, Wood Pigeons, Chaffinches etc), foraging among the plants for slugs, snails, worms and insects. 




I even found a frog at the front of my home the other day.  A tiny thing.  There is no water there in my border but the ground cover plants form a kind of mulch and underneath the plant growth the soil is generally damp.  It is in the dampness that slugs like to hide out and I have no doubt that the frog was dining out on them. I see no signs of slug damage in that border.  In fact, I rarely see signs of slug damage in my garden.  I grow my hostas surrounded by gravel, in containers, raised off the ground. 

Goldfinches 2016