What have you seen

25 gold finches on the feeders today

Oneputt I'm sorry but I have to ask this question. Do you see 25 gold finches at the same time? If so how many feeders do you have? We have a couple of seed feeders and a couple of fat ball feeders that are busy all day, including gold finch 😆 but never see that many different birds at once including the groundfeeders let alone one species.

When I have done the big bird or butterfly count I undertood number to be recorded was the most I had seen at once within the time frame to avoid duplicates. Have I been sending in duff figures?  😲

Just sent 15 starlings all together devouring the mealworms on the grass.

We have 4 different feeders but they use them like a pit stop, hanging around in nearby trees and bushes so quite easy to count.  As far as bird counts are concerned I just count the number of birds entering the garden during the allotted time.  I would think that the RSPB probably use some type of weighting tool to come up with the numbers

That makes sense 😆. We have queues but they sit in the evergreen shrub adjacent or one on the other side of the garden and flit on and off the feeders quickly. Next oor have a cat that likes to lurk so assume birds are wise to it.

We had cats years ago but didn't feed the birds then. When we had the now 'holiday' dog living here cats stayed out of the garden.  Last time holiday dog visited not sure who got biggest shock her or next doors cat 😲. Cat's creeping back now.

We had "twelve" useing our feeders on Sunday or was it one coming back every few minutes

We use a "super soaker" to deter cats. The icy cold water doesn't harm them, but they don't like it one bit. Cats aren't daft, they soon realise where they're not welcome and give our garden a miss when they're on their rounds.

I actually like cats, just don't want them killing "my" garden birds. 😊

I saw about the same number of goldfinches today as OP when out for our afternoon walk in the bushes alongside the main road into town. This morning there was a GSW on a Cherry Tree on the green in the middle of our estate. Have never seen one there before.

Talking of feeders, don't see the numbers of green finches on them these days. Also, would expect to see the siskins by now, where are they all?

Haven't seen any greenfinches for ages, much depends on the weather if the garden visitors increase when they need a bit more food. We've just sent off for some new fatballs and they don't seem to be quite as popular. 

Down at East Head near Wittering yesterday, there were masses of Brent geese. Also same a pair of sandpipers and a solitary lapwing. I think most of the birds must have been hunkered down to get out of the biting wind.