Squirrel Nut Feeder

I have been enthralled reading Shirley's accounts of Red Squirrels visiting her garden. See Shirl's Gardenwatch.  It was interesting to see a simple suggestion of using a clothes peg to hold up the lid on a nut feeder until the squirrel got used to lifting the lid itself. Of course I had to try out the idea myself. Unfortunately we do not have the attractive native Red Squirrels in my part of the country. I have to make do with the imported Grey Squirrel.

First job, find the nut feeder I though I had. Long search, nothing. Then I remembered the one I had was plastic, well squirrel chewed and had a fixed lid. So, make one or look for something to convert. Another long search eventually turned up an old wooden nest box which I set about converting:



Now I have to wait for a squirrel to visit and find the new food stash and see what happens.

Wordless Wednesday

Friday at the Flicks - Blue Tits

This was just a bit of practice with the free Mac video editor - MovieMator
As MovieMator crashed ever time I tried to add any titles I had to finish the video in iMovie:

We Belong Together

Looking at this photo you might think the Robin was keeping an eye out for any predator:



Actually I had been watching a pair of Robins for a while. It was a fair bet that two Robins close together in the same garden meant a possible breeding pair. This pair kept moving from place to place. Whenever the female rested the male would start displaying, bowing down and then lifting his head to show the full effect of his red breast. When this photo was taken the female was perched on a wire above his head.

I was hoping to catch the moment when the male offers food to the female. I have seen it once in the past but if it happened this time it was out of sight.

Wordless Wednesday

The Grey Acrobat

Earlier in the year I took down the pole which was holding the seed feeders and replaced it with a rope. The Grey Squirrel had been finding it too easy to get at the bird food and was eating a disproportionate amount. This way I hoped to slow it down somewhat. It took a few goes for the squirrel to work out the best way to approach the new set up but it soon became adept at balancing:







This morning I managed to grab a short piece of video before it disappeared:

Sunset Wednesday