A time to sit

I returned from UK at the beginning of this week and went back to work on Tuesday, anticipating a very busy week with not much time to sit!

My time spent amongst nature in my Dad’s garden seems a very long time ago now although only a week has passed by, a very busy week.

Before flying home from England I spent some time with the family of a client with whom I had worked some thirty years ago, who died just before Christmas. I had been invited to read at her Memorial Service which turned out to be something very special and I will write about it here later.

I arrived back in Germany on Monday evening and had to be at work in the Kindergarten group the following morning by eight-thirty, I was needed in the school group in the afternoon and had two adults' sessions after that, closing the day with our second conductive music session.

And so the week carried on in this busy mode until Thursday afternoon.

After working in the city on Thursday at InBestForm, the inclusive, disabled and non-disabled group for elderly clients, I was able to be at home a couple of hours earlier than my norm and decided to take my cup of tea out on my balcony for a sit and a bit of communing with nature, just as I had been doing with my Dad in Norwich.

Spring had sprung this week

I had cycled home on Wednesday in a 25°C heat wave and Thursday was still warm, so there was no need to wrap myself up in a blanket as I had done when last out on the balcony before Easter. I settled down to enjoy my first opportunity to sit amongst my spring flowers and listen to the birds singing.

As I sat back with tea and a pile of out-of-date and unread Guardian Weeklies I started to snooze.  But I was brought back to life when I realized that there seemed to be more collared doves hopping around and cooing than I was used to. Gabor and Giselle had been my customary companions in the early spring, having nested in ‘my tree’ many times since I have lived here. But on Thursday evening there were four doves, two babies had joined in the cooing and were eager to be fed. By Saturday evening, having been huddled together at noon they were nowhere to be seen, perhaps already having flown the nest, or maybe they just made it to a different branch. By Sunday there were certainly gone, Gabor and Giselle too, off on holiday I expect for a rest!

On Thursday I had spotted their delicate platform-like nest only a few feet away from me, just above eye level. I was so sorry to have missed all their comings and goings over the past three weeks, but there was to be a lot more action for me to enjoy. While the doves were busy feeding to one side of me a couple of blackbirds started hopping around in the tree to the front. It seemed that after all I was about to see some nesting action for Mr. and Mrs. Blackbird were very busy collecting nesting materials, their mouths full of moss and muddy, leafy material!

But where was the building site? Some detective work was called for.

It did not take long for my eyes to scan my tiny balcony and discover the blackbird’s nest tucked down low, behind my table, beside the empty flower pots and troughs. 

Friday

 

Sunday

By Friday morning there was a definite hollow in the earth and a little bit of moss had appeared. I decided to lend them a helping hand in their search for muddy building materials in order to prevent them emptying my flower troughs. I had learnt from my Mum what blackbirds like as she always left out a tray of soil and compost on the patio, that she watered regularly. This stopped the birds pulling up her seedlings.

It worked well for her and it worked for me too. I am surprised how often the tray needed topping up. All my plants are still firmly rooted and my neighbour’s patio below is not covered with mud.

 

I am really looking forward to the next days, waiting in expectation of the first egg to be laid. After that there will be a patient wait for the chicks to hatch and then a week or two of feeding frenzy before the birds fledge and fly off.

The female blackbird was happily hopping around my feet this lunchtime as I turned my chair and hat another sit in the sun. I will continue to join them on my balcony for ever-lengthening spells so that they get used to me. I am sure that once the eggs are laid and the birds are sitting on them I will be ignored and I can have a bird’s-eye view. I also hope that I can be home early on a few evenings in the following weeks so I can be part of the action.

PS

 

Peregrines in Norwich 2013

" My house in the winter snow,
with spring flower, a bird  and tree with summer's leaves"
by E, aged 5 years

Watch the birdy!

Despite the snow and wind in Norwich the peregrines returned to their nesting box on the cathedral spire and have already produced two eggs –

http://upp.hawkandowl.org/norwich-peregrines/live-peregrine-web-cam-2013/

http://www.facebook.com/HawkandOwlTrust

I wonder whether my blackbirds will return to their nesting place on my balcony this year. They were there a few weeks ago on a sunny Sunday morning making a mess pecking at the window boxes, but since the soil has been frozen again ever since there has been no more activity.

A birdie PS

Those baby blackbirds have flown the nest!

Well, not exactly flown the nest as they cannot fly yet. They have sort of flopped and fluttered out of it.

Yesterday they were stretching legs and wings by wandering into the window-box. I woke this morning to find an empty nest and the two birds were again sitting in the window-box. As I left for work I discovered that one had fallen to the ground below so I put my hat over him and carried him back upstairs. When I returned at lunch time both nest and window-box were empty and only one bird was to be seen in the tree. Dad, ever present, was squawking at me like crazy.

I had a lovely weekend enjoying watching the young being fed and listening to them chirping away each time Dad appeared in sight. I will miss them all and hope that they will return next year. I will leave their empty nest just where it is, just in case.

More chapters in the ‘blackbird-babies-upbringing’ saga

One of my birthday cards

My balcony from below

The baby blackbirds are almost ready for off!

I made an unscheduled flight back to the UK last weekend this meant that the blackbird family who are living on my balcony were left in peace. Although when I left only three of the four eggs had hatched when I returned five days later only two of the naked, dinosaur-like creatures had developed into mini-birds with a few feathers forming.

I have spent the last week peering at the babies between feeds and today these lovely fluffy creatures with wide yellow beaks are hopping up and down the window-box as they squawk for their food.

Mummy blackbird remains relaxed as I sit outside with my coffee and newspaper but the Dad is still giving me a hard time even when I am only looking out of the shut window in the moment that he arrives with a worm. With Dadmuch more active in the feeding with Mum taking a well earned rest, I am being extra careful not to frighten him off although it is really difficult with all the racket going on in and around the tree to keep away from the action.

I suspect that the offspring will be gone in a couple of days. I hope that they fly off rather than fall out. They are getting precariously near to the edge of the box at the moment as they stretch to be first in line for grubs.

Here is a photographic update on the blackbird babies

June 25th, 2012

June 26th, 2012

July 3rd, 2012

July 4th, 2012

July 7th, 2012

July 8th, 2012

Sunday July 8th, 2012, and Dad blackbird is still shouting at me, even through the shut window!

A very, very short motion picture!

Mrs Blackbird

The nest is in the bottom centre of this picture, at the far left of the box

"And then there were four!"

"They are just like Cadbury's Mini Eggs!"

"Keeping a beady eye on me"

Making friends

It is now two weeks since I began sharing my balcony with a blackbird family. Mrs Blackbird, while sitting on her four beautiful eggs or perching on the side of the window-box having a stretch, has become quite used to me popping out now and then to check on the weather or to water the plants, and also to keep a check on how she is.

Last Sunday she even let me sit in my chair beside her and read the newspaper.

Today I could get really close again to take a new photograph of her on the nest. I had actually rushed in to get the camera when I discovered that she had left the nest for her early morning stretch but by the time I got back the nest was filled with her fluffed up body again.

Is Dad standing by?

I have not seen the black Mr Blackbird since before my trip to England. It was the male bird that I had spotted making a mess of my plant pots when gathering mud for the nest. I hope that he is still around and will reappear to help out with the feeding frenzy that will soon begin.

If Dad has come to an unfortunate end then I will have to give a helping hand by purchasing Mrs Blackbird some maggots from the fishing-tackle shop and leaving them on the balcony for her.

That is something else that I learnt from my Mum!

With a family of keen fisherman there was often a can of maggots in the fridge.  My Mum, with Dad’s full approval, often raided this tin, placing some of the contents on a tray in the middle of the lawn. She did this particularly to help out her robin friends, who fed from her hand, when there was a huge family of baby-birds to feed. She also fed the robins grubs that she found while raking the moss from the lawn to use to line her hanging flower-baskets. These grubs were specialities that the robins always took fresh from her fingers!

Dad has the photographs, I will ask him for them when I next see him!

Norwich peregrines

The young birds fledged two weeks ago but still the Hawk and Owl Trust Forum is inaction. There are some wonderful photographs to be found there by the contributors on the forum, one such set can be found here—

http://www.flickr.com/photos/chrissyboy/7409879986/in/photostream

You can find others by scrolling though the Forum topic-list –

https://secure.onestopcms.co.uk/OneStopCMS/Core/TemplateHandler.aspx?NRMODE=Published&NRNODEGUID={1E4880C9-87B5-4FA6-8061-0D77FDF53EBD}&NRORIGINALURL=%2fTrustAtWork%2fConservation%2fUrbanperegrines%2fNorPeregrionesForum&NRCACHEHINT=NoModifyLoggedIn&site={10878011-eb74-47f9-9a81-75ce0e6ab32d}

The Flying-Conductor is home to roost

Between 14.30 and 17.00, June 10th, 2012

Norwich peregrines and Nürnberg blackbirds

I am home to roost having done what seemed like around-the-world-in-eighty-days but was only in fact popping-around-Europe-in-fifteen —

Nürnberg-Dusseldorf-London-Norwich-Birmingham-Sheffield-Norwich-London-Dusseldorf-Nürnberg-Vienna-Nürnberg! 

While in England I saw my Dad, Aimee and the rest of the family, a few friends and the Norwich Peregrines. I risked travelling by train and got out from the Norfolk sticks to the Midlands and back without any delays, despite being evacuated from one station due to a fire! 

Unfortunately I saw the sea only from the plane and the Queen only on the television but I experienced Viennese waltzing, and Klimt and Schiele paintings, first hand in Austria! 

I was glad to have caught sight of the Norfolk birds and experienced some Queen’s Jubilee fever, even though I missed all the street parties. By the time the British began partying in the streets I was enjoying Viennese culture and eating Dobos Torte with a picture of Klimt’s painting, The Kiss, on the top.

More about the travels later, this is supposed to be about birds.

Peregrines

I tried my best to follow the life of the peregrines at Norwich Cathedral after I left Norwich but I had only seen a few glimpses of the chick’s darkening feathers on the webcam and did not have the opportunity to read the messages on the Forum for several days. Therefore I had not realised earlier that there were such concerns for the health of the smallest of the three chicks.

As I tuned in to the peregrines on Sunday morning I thought at first that one of the chicks had already flown the nest, Sunday being the day that the experts in the peregrine-watching tent in Norwich had told me is the expected fledging day. I soon realized that one bird, the smaller of the two male birds, had died in the early hours of the morning. The remaining two have since spent most of the day flapping around their nest-box and on the ledge, preening away the last fluffy feathers and receiving food from the parent birds.

http://www.hawkandowl.org/NR/exeres/FC55CF4D-985C-4C84-BC88-D665F12EFEC0

https://secure.onestopcms.co.uk/OneStopCMS/Core/TemplateHandler.aspx?NRMODE=Published&NRNODEGUID={1E4880C9-87B5-4FA6-8061-0D77FDF53EBD}&NRORIGINALURL=%2fTrustAtWork%2fConservation%2fUrbanperegrines%2fNorPeregrionesForum%3fpage%3d1&NRCACHEHINT=NoModifyLoggedIn&page=1&site={10878011-eb74-47f9-9a81-75ce0e6ab32d}

Blackbirds

When I had come home for a few hours at the beginning of the week, to swap suitcases before heading off to Austria, I was nearly hit, full in the face, by a frightened blackbird as I stepped out on to my tiny balcony.

I noticed that the blackbirds that I have often seen hopping around in the trees nearby had been digging up the herbs from my plant pots. Last spring I had prevented these birds from messing up the patio below with their pickings from my window-boxes by quickly planting strawberries and geraniums. The birds left the boxes alone this year but it appeared that they had hopped down to a lower level to help themselves to nest-building material from the pots on the wooden, decking floor.

Before I continued with my around-Europe-in-fifteen-days trip I cleared up the mess, watered the plants, and forgot about it.

On Sunday morning I went out to see what was happening in my tree-decked balcony-world outside the kitchen door. I had checked whether I needed to water anything and pulled off a few dead leaves before I discovered a nest in the window-box at the furthest point from the door, snuggled in the soil beyond the geraniums where one of last year’s strawberries had been struggling to survive. 

It is a blackbird’s nest and it belongs to those messy blackbirds that hop around my balcony picking at my pots!

It was empty when I discovered it but that was no surprise to me as it was so newly built. 

There had been no sign of it at the beginning of the week. It is quite unbelievable that in the space of just five days such an architectural wonder can be built by two small birds. 

I wondered whether I had disturbed the owners of the nest with my comings and goings since I returned home to my own roost, and I feared that they may abandon it. I checked at regular intervals but there was no sign of life, then at lunch-time today I saw a beak and a tail poking up amongst the geranium leaves. 

A few hours later I peered out of the window and noticed that the nest was empty again. Oh dear, had I disturbed them when I opened the fridge door? Or when I put on the light? 

What a distraction these new neighbours will be if they decide to stay.

As there was no one on the nest to disturb I opened the door to let in the fresh air and I had another peep at the beautifully lined, perfectly round and very clean and tidy nest. Low and behold, during the short time that the nest had been occupied, bright blue egg-number-one had been laid. It is in the middle of the nest and there hardly looks to be enough room for any more to join it. But more there are sure to be as no one is keeping this one warm yet. 

The egg is not oval like a hen’s egg but fatter at one end and much more pointy at the other. So when it rolls it will roll around in a circle inside the nest.

An hour or so later, in a pause from peregrine-watching on the Internet, I checked up on the blackbird’s nest. I noticed the mum bird perched on a branch beside her nest watching me through the door with one beady eye, with the other one on her beautiful egg in the just-as-beautiful nest. She seemed not to be afraid of me only a little protective.

‘That’s nice’, I thought, ‘She is not afraid, perhaps I really will have lots of company again this summer’.

I am not sure whether when summer comes and the cold dreary days like today pass by, that I will be just as happy to have company because I doubt that I will be able to sit outside in my chair that is placed all of twelve inches, that’s thirty centimetres, from the nest, but it is exciting enough to put up with it for a few weeks.

This is the first time that I have seen bird’s eggs this closely since I was a child when my dad lifted me up to see a nest full of blue-tit’s eggs in one of the many nest-boxes in our garden.

PS

It is Monday morning and the Norfolk peregrines are still on their nesting platform, and as I write there is still only one egg in the Nürnberg blackbirds’ nest. I have every hope that there will soon be two eggs as Mrs Blackbird has just returned!

PPS

Before posting Mrs Blackbird had laid egg number two!

12 o'clock, midday, June 11th, 2012