Tag: birds

First visitors to the new Bird Feeder

Post author By Christine
Post date September 26, 2011
11 Comments on First visitors to the new Bird Feeder

I hung the new bird feeder on Saturday after following the instructions that came with it and on Sunday I saw my first bird – although fleeting. I peeped through the window wondering whether any birds had been and there was one. He darted off very quickly though. Since then, I’ve looked a few times and believe it or not, every time I’ve seen a little visitor! What Joy!

This afternoon I sat for a few moments (camera in hand) hopeful that I might get a photo and three arrived at once, a beautiful Sunbird that was chased away by this Witoogie. Witoogie then spent a few minutes sitting, drinking, looking around, drinking again and then off he went. (Click the photos to see the large versions).

Todays Visitor

[one_half]Witoogie arrives[/one_half]

[one_half_last]Witoogie drinks[/one_half_last]

[one_half]Witoogie looks straight at me[/one_half]

[one_half_last]And looking for his buddies[/one_half_last]

How cute was that?

The bird feeder came with instructions to add red food colouring the first time as it attracts the birds to the new feeder. Once your feeding station “becomes known” by the birds, you stop using the food colouring.

The feeder comes with two different “nozzles”. The short one (which I have on mine now) is for short-beaked birds. The longer one is for sunbirds and long beaked birds. As I witnessed, some of the short-beaked birds are bullies and will dominate the feeder so the answer is to have two – one for the Sunbirds and one for the others.

Now that I know it works and that the birds will use it I will get another.

Happy Gardening
xxx

Tags bird bath, bird nest, birds, sunbird

Christine's garden Design Gardening Trees

For the Birds …

Barbie, this post is especially for you to show you two new additions to the Brazilian Pepper in the back garden. Remember you commented last week that you’d hang things from the tree? Well I took that to heart and then I found this cute bird nectar feeder at the nursery and decided my birdies that wake me at 5 am every morning might make a bit less noise if they had something to drink back there 🙂

Then I also moved the green “bird house” to the back because they never use it in the front. I don’t know why they don’t – it is still full of all the bird seed I originally put in it. Possibly because Dexter is always in the front garden? Or maybe they just didn’t like its position? We’ll see if they use it now. It would be splendid if they do!

Hope you approve 🙂
What else should I hang in the tree?

Monday morning update – Just spotted a bird drinking from the feeder! Yay!

Happy Gardening
xxx

Tags bird bath, bird nest, birds

Christine's garden Home page features Miscellaneous

And now for something completely different

Post author By Christine
Post date May 27, 2011
7 Comments on And now for something completely different

Off Topic Alert! If you are only here for the gardening, this won’t interest you, but if you love wildlife, then you’re in for a treat because today I am sharing our photographs of a recent trip to the Kruger National Park. I often prattle on about the “wildlife” in my garden which includes all sorts of bugs and insects, wasps, spiders, praying mantises and the like, but “my wildlife” is fairly inactive here right now because of the cooler weather. And as there is really nothing going on in my garden right now and I’m having serious “Gardening Blog Withdrawals”, I thought I’d take this time to share one of South Africa’s national treasures – the wildlife in the Kruger National Park.

For our friends overseas that are not familiar with South Africa, Kruger Park is the largest game or wildlife reserve in South Africa – larger than Israel, it is nearly 2 million hectares of land that stretch for 352 kilometres (20 000 square kilometres) from north to south along the Mozambique border and is given over to an almost indescribable wildlife experience. It undoubtably ranks with the best in Africa and is the flagship of the country’s national parks.I don’t want to bore you with any long stories about the park (seeing as this is off-topic), so lets look at the photographs …

Kruger Park Photographs (click to enlarge)

[one_half]Elephant in Kruger[/one_half]

[one_half_last]Another Elephant[/one_half_last]

[one_half]Rhino crossing the path[/one_half]

[one_half_last]Crocodile sun-bathing[/one_half_last]

[one_half]Zebra in Kruger[/one_half]

[one_half_last]View from the lodge[/one_half_last]

[one_half]Wildebeest at the waterhole[/one_half]

[one_half_last]Hippopotamus going for a swim[/one_half_last]

[one_half]Giraffe[/one_half]

[one_half_last]Giraffe in Kruger[/one_half_last]

[one_half]Baboon[/one_half]

[one_half_last]Yellow-billed Hornbill[/one_half_last]

[one_half]Rhino[/one_half]

[one_half_last]Lilac-breated Roller[/one_half_last]

[one_half]Lion in Kruger[/one_half]

[one_half_last]Lioness in Kruger[/one_half_last]

[one_half]Cape Buffalo[/one_half]

[one_half_last]African dung beetle[/one_half_last]

I hope you enjoyed my little off-topic post.

Happy gardening
xxx

Tags birds, kruger national park, wildlife

Christine's garden Gardening Home page features Trees

Birds a bathing

Every morning when I sit in my office, for about two hours I hear the non-stop chirping and tweeting of birds. They have three bird baths which are situated in the Water Feature (in the side garden) which they seem to like but I’ve noticed that they prefer the trees in the front garden (the Frangipani and Willow trees in particular). I recently added two free standing bird baths to the front garden for them but up until today had never seen them being used by the birds. Until today … and use them they did! What a lovely way to start my day – with a cup of coffee and camera in hand they allowed me to sit quietly whilst they went about their morning ritual at the bath.

A few days ago I put a cutting of a plant in the bath as I assumed they weren’t using it – well one of them decided it needed to be taken out – he picked it up and flew off with it, taking it into the Willow Tree!

Here are a few photographs …

Birds in the bath

Bird removes my cutting and takes it to the willow tree …

Conference in the Frangipani Tree …

That’s All Folks! Happy gardening
xxx

Tags bird bath, bird nest, birds

Christine's garden Gardening Home page features Trees

Look what I found whilst weeding!

Post author By Christine
Post date March 3, 2011
17 Comments on Look what I found whilst weeding!

I’m sure for seasoned gardeners this is no big deal, but I was excited (and a bit dismayed) to find this little birds nest lying in my garden today whilst I was pulling out weeds. I was excited because it’s the first time I’ve found one (and it provided a great photo-op for the new macro lens) and because it tells me that the birds like living in my trees. On inspection, I then found a few more bird nests in my actual trees – but the others are all a lot bigger than this one.

This sweet little nest is about 12cm in diameter at it largest width. Any ideas about what type of bird this would belong to? Oh, and another question – what is the correct thing to do when finding a nest on the ground? Just leave it there? (that’s what I’ve done, for now).

I was a bit upset because I was worried about the “nest owner” missing her home, but perhaps they have built a new one? There were no eggs in it so I assume they no longer need it. On my shopping list – I’ve ordered a new bird bath from Peppino’s which will arrive ~~next week~~ tomorrow (Yay!). This will go out back where there is no water feature and I found the other bird nests. They need a bath and water so I need to supply … right?

[one_half]Birds Nest[/one_half]

[one_half_last]Closer view[/one_half_last]

Happy gardening
xxx

Tags bird nest, birds, weeds

Christine's garden Home page features Miscellaneous

Close encounter with a Hadeda

Post author By Christine
Post date February 1, 2011
5 Comments on Close encounter with a Hadeda

I was taking a walk around my garden to see what I could photograph for a blog post – and it walked right up to me – a Hadeda lunching on my earthworms! The amazing thing was that Hercules was walking with me and the Hadeda was completely unfazed by our very close presence and by being followed by us, me snapping away in the hope of getting at least one good photograph. The walkabout lasted for about ten minutes until we had followed her all the way from the back garden to the pond and then she decided she had had enough … either of us or of munching on earthworms, and she took flight.

I often see the Hadedas in my garden. I don’t actually like them much – they are usually in the garden in groups of two or three and they trample on the plants damaging them and mess all over the place (read: crap on the patio). And they are big birds so the mess they leave on the patio is large! Not little dove droppings, I’m talking about huge Hadeda droppings. So whilst they are not unwelcome (I love having birds in the garden), they are not exactly my favourite visitors – much like the loud noisy neighbours one tolerates once in a blue moon!

[one_half][/one_half]

[one_half_last][/one_half_last]

For anyone interested and not familiar with the Hadeda here is some info I found on Wikipedia:
The Hadeda or Hadeda Ibis, Bostrychia hagedash, is a ibis found in Sub-Saharan Africa. The Hadeda is a large (up to 76 cm long), dark brown ibis with a white “moustache”, glossy greenish purple wings, a large black bill with a red stripe on the upper mandible, and blackish legs. It feeds mainly on earthworms, using its long scimitar-like bill to probe soft soil. It also eats larger insects, such as the Parktown Prawn, as well as spiders and small lizards. These birds also favour snails and will feed in garden beds around residential homes. It has a distinctively loud and recognisable haa-haa-haa-de-dah call that is often heard when the birds are flying or are startled, hence the name. More info about Hadeda here: Hadeda Ibis.

Tags birds, dove, hadeda

Christine's garden Miscellaneous

Birds in my garden

Photo I took of the doves in my garden. The doves gave me a great show today – they were doing the “wild thang”, and were very unfussed by Dexter and my presence and the camera. I love the birds in the garden – they wake me up every morning from about 5 am as they dart from tree to tree picking off the berries.

I also have starlings who visit our pond every day for a drink of water and a wash in the bird baths. Sometimes we have as many as six of them playing in the baths when its very hot. Unfortunately they are too fast for me to take photographs, but I will keep trying.

Tags birds, doves, starling