RSPB Birdwatch 24-26 January 2025

Birdwatch next weekend.

I am putting food out on a table close to the house so that the birds come and feed close enough to be seen. I also have my binoculars at the ready.

I think it’s done in winter as the branches are bare so birds are easier to spot. Also we have a lot of winter visitors.

I surprised it's not done twice a year as some are winter visitors and others return in the spring.

I feed the birds every day throughout the year and hope to take part in the Birdwatch again, but I have found in previous years that it’s almost as though the birds know they’re being watched even though I keep out of sight, and don’t turn up. I have lots of blackbirds in particular visiting at present but of course many of them will be winter immigrants, not native birds. I shall also add my usual visiting gull, regardless of whether the RSPB want to know of its existence!

yes, i look forward to this every year. will do it from my sisters this year as i am there every day with being her carer. She has a much more active garden and i feed the birds and wildlife so hopefully there will be plenty around that weekend

It does seem an odd time.
A better time might be early spring when they're building nests.

Apparently it's because we're more likely to feed birds in winter so they visit our gardens more often.

I see far more later on.

Does anybody know why the RSPB choose the worst time of the winter to have a garden bird watch? I haven’t seen a bird in my garden for weeks - not even the ubiquitous magpie - and even in the lanes bordering the farmland here they are conspicuous by their absence! How can they get anything like an accurate count?

Indigo8

Apparently, gull don't count. I had a rather curt message from RSPB some years ago, when I tried to count them, as they are sea birds and not garden birds.

Ha ha ha to the RSPB, please keep up! Gulls are scavengers and we are miles from the sea.

Apparently, gull don't count. I had a rather curt message from RSPB some years ago, when I tried to count them, as they are sea birds and not garden birds.

Oh, and gulls which have increased in number here.

Wheniwasyourage

Every time we've tried it, the birds just disappear. Actually it's too early yet for many birds to be around this far north. It was the same with the butterfly count last summer - not a butterfly to be seen until a couple of weeks after the count finished, then they were all over the place.

Ditto, Wheniwasyourage

I see several varieties in our garden on occasion but when it's the RSPB Birdwatch, all I see are pigeons, sparrows and an occasional crow.

To those saying they weren't doing it because they didn't see many birds, this information is still valuable to those keeping statistics.

I was reading an account of a teacher in Nova Scotia who for years would get his young students to report the first robin of the year to him, which he recorded. I believe this was started in 1920's or earlier. The data was useful in tracking how climate change has impacted bird range and migration. So even if you don't see many species, it is worth making notes.

Yes I will again. Last year when I heard back that we see above the national average. Thrilled with that.

I’ll be doing it. I don’t tend to see many though, they seem to know it’s garden bird watch weekend and disappear. Often, the weather is wet and windy so they tend to hide away.
I’ve had to stop feeding the birds because we were getting vermin, but do leave water out.

Yesterday the field was black with rooks/carrion crows who then descended on my trees and I often count at least 10 magpies these days.

I do that anyway Septima or I wouldn’t be recording many species. Having said that there are hardly any species anyway just rooks and magpies in abundance since they are no longer culled ( thanks Chris Packham). They destroy eggs and small fledglings so we hardly see any small bird species anymore. Pigeons are still around.

We unfortunately don’t feed the birds as we had rats. But we do put out water. I really hope that we will see more birds in the future because of the many tree-planting schemes in various parts of the country.

I personally think the RSPB is missing a trick by limiting the watching time to an hour. Different birds feed at different times. They ask us to record the maximum number of any bird species that we see at one time so that we don't keep counting the same bird coming back. Why can't we do that but over a whole day or even the whole weekend? As long as we only count the maximum of each type we see together we'll surely record more species.

Yes, but as above, the birds disappear as soon as I get organised to count them. We had a wren and a dunnock visit a couple of weeks ago, but I don’t suppose either of them will appear on the allotted day!

Yes, we will be taking part but, as said above, our birds disappear so we look for several sessions and submit the one with some birds in it. One year that meant submitting two starlings.
Usually our garden is busy with all sorts. I don’t feed as much as I used too but water is always available and that attracts them.

Yes I'm taking part again. I look after the birds all year round. Lots of different species. My garden is full of birds at various times of the day. The birds repay me by looking after the plants in the garden, eating the bugs etc.

I have been doing for quite a few years now. It is sad that there are fewer different species of bird and fewer birds generally each successive year.

Yes, we’ll take part. We’ve seen 32 different birds (not all at once, of course) in our garden over the years, as we’re surrounded by woodland here in Kent. We get great pleasure watching them.

Every time we've tried it, the birds just disappear. Actually it's too early yet for many birds to be around this far north. It was the same with the butterfly count last summer - not a butterfly to be seen until a couple of weeks after the count finished, then they were all over the place.