Garden Birds (1): January 2011

January 2011: my Garden Bird Wordle

We were surprised how few birds we saw in our garden during the RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch last week. I thought it might be interesting to log the species seen each month from our home here in South Wales, UK. This will just be the result of 'casual' observations - nothing very scientific, but it will be interesting to see whether the variety of species noted increases as the weather improves. The larger the size of the word in the Wordle above, the more birds of that species it represents. My only guidelines have been as follows:

1] To record birds that are seen from the house.
2] These birds must land (e.g. on the lawn, in a tree, on a fence or roof).
3] If I know that a pair of birds (e.g. the male and female Blackbird) are regular visitors, I will only count them once for a particular, even if I notice them most days.

In case you are interested in the actual numbers, well, here is my estimate (based largely on our RSPB Birdwatch hour, since the idea of a monthly round-up for January only came to me retrospectively):

• Starling - 21 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  (Red Conservation Status)
• House Sparrow - 4  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . (Red Conservation Status)
• Chaffinch - 4   . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . (Green Conservation Status)
• Magpie - 2  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   (Green Conservation Status)
• Blackbird - 2 regular visitors, a male and a female . . . . (Green Conservation Status)
• Dunnock - 2  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . (Amber Conservation Status)
• Great Tit - 2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  (Green Conservation Status)
• Song Thrush - 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . (Red Conservation Status)
• Robin - 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  (Green Conservation Status)   

N.B. the RSPB site says that male and female Robins look identical, with only the juveniles lacking the fine red colour. I had always thought that female Robins were more muted than males.

Robin (Erithacus rubecula)