30 Days Wild - Week Two

[smallhobbit]

Week Two was supposed to be about moving around and enjoying the wildlife, although for various reasons I didn't do that much.

Although I was outside hanging up the washing, and I refilled the water bowls at the same time.



And when I did go for one walk I spotted the house martins flying overhead, the sparrows twittering in the bushes and a bumble bee on a dog rose.

I also signed up for surveys by the British Trust for Ornithology as I do like to spot the birds in our garden and having to count them might help me take more notice of them in a way which fits in with my general lifestyle.  In particular, I joined the Blackbirds in Gardens survey, which is looking at the effects of the Usutu virus on the blackbird population in the UK.  So far I haven't seen any blackbirds in our garden, but when I went for a walk yesterday I saw four blackbirds less than 100 metres from our house.  One of the reasons we don't have that many birds in our garden is that we are very close to an area of bushes and trees which are ideal for them.

This is the track I walked down, which is less than 15 minutes from home, and shows why birds don't find our garden as appealing as they might:

   

And here's my badge for Week Two:


 

Comments

[debriswoman]

Excellent:-)
Do you use any of the bird song identifying apps?

[smallhobbit]

Thank you! No yet, have you tried any of them?

[debriswoman]

Other half uses Merlin…it’s really quite fascinating :-)

[smallhobbit]

It looks fascinating! Thank you for the suggestion.

[debriswoman]

The only real excuse for looking at a mobile phone while on a walk :-p

[adafrog]

Pretty.

[smallhobbit]

Thank you 😀

[stonepicnicking_okapi]

Nice badge! Everything looks very green and lush!

[smallhobbit]

It is 😀 We're doing okay so far this year.

[rusty_armour]

I really like that first photo. You have some very nice plants in your garden.

I think it's great that you've signed up to do surveys for the British Trust for Ornithology and Blackbirds in Gardens survey. It's nice that you have blackbirds near your house, even if they don't seem to make it into your garden. Obviously, it's nothing personal if they have those trees and bushes to go to instead.

I hope you continue to find interesting wildlife. On a recent walk, I managed to hear and spot a hawk (I don't know which kind, but there's a good chance it was a Red-Tailed Hawk) and see a rabbit on the sidewalk before it hopped across the street.

[smallhobbit]

Thank you very much. One of the things I'm keen to do is spend more time observing wildlife, so this seems to be giving me the incentive to do so.

I'm impressed you saw a hawk!