Wednesday 21 November 2012

Wings on Wednesday

It is a long time since I last had a Wings on Wednesday entry. Amazingly, for the time of year, there has been a dearth of birds visiting the garden this month. Every now and then there is a rush of House Sparrows or Starlings and the Great Tits and Coal Tits are pretty regular but the numbers are well down so far this Winter.

One fleeting visitor was a Stock Dove. I haven't seen one of those for months so this was a welcome sighting.

IMG_5057 Stock Dove.jpg

Not quite so welcome was an early morning visit from a Sparrowhawk. This one was sat on the back of an old wooden chair right next to the Birdy Bistro. What I particularly noticed was the way it had its darker back facing outwards which made it blend in better with the fence in the background.

IMG_5068 Sparrow Hawk.jpg

As soon as it spotted me it flew away to hunt for breakfast elsewhere.


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Rain Gauge:

Only a little further with the rain gauge project. Added the ability to switch off the lCD readout in software. The collector is now outside and the electronics in the conservatory while I see how well it works. 3 mm rain recorded yesterday, 4 mm so far this morning.

The unit uses a 9V wall wart power supply but also automatically changes over to a battery during any power interruption - a far from unknown event in this area.

I have decided to change the Arduino Nano for a Mega as the Mega has internal memory I can use to store the results which looks easier to program than the SD card.

9 comments:

  1. oh, my! that sparrowhawk is beautiful! i like the dove, too! may they stay far apart. :)

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  2. It looks like your rain gauge is going to work overtime at the moment John.

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    Replies
    1. Certainly non stop yesterday Roy and another dollop tonight by the looks of things.

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  3. That Sparrowhawk looks like it has gathered a grey cloak around itself, and, as you say, camouflaged itself exceedingly well against the fence. The stock dove is a beauty ~

    How deep can your rain gauge measure?

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    1. Must have been in Harry Potter mode Glo. Stock doves look at their best when bright sunlight glints on their shiny neck feathers.

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    2. Glo: The rain gauge measures as much as falls. With the seasaw mechanism it automatically empties the side which tips down so it can go on measuring for ever.

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  4. Lovely to see the Stock Dove John, I haven't seen one for a while now, they are only very occasional visitors to my garden.

    What a clever observation you made about the Sparrowhawk's position, that wouldn't have occurred to me!

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    Replies
    1. Sporadic visitors here Jan. They tend to come for a few days and then there will be weeks without a Stock Dove.
      I'm not sure whether the Sparrowhawk just stayed as it landed or whether it chose to hide its brighter feathers as I didn't see it arrive.

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Thank you for visiting. Hope you enjoyed the pictures. Any comment, or correction to any information or identification I get wrong, is most welcome. John

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