ED Nature Watch

[ianr]

23 minutes ago, malumbu said:

Got loads of frogspawn.  Don't have that much success as can't keep it in the pond as the newts eat it. 

Any chance of  fobbing them off with tapioca pudding?

[malumbu]

I hear they are nice in your wellies, free frogspawn to anyone who know the literary  reference

[Sue]

8 hours ago, malumbu said:

Got loads of frogspawn.  Don't have that much success as can't keep it in the pond as the newts eat it.  I took the first clump out yesterday and put it in a bucket with netting on top.  The loads more appeared.,...

Last year I kept it like this and then transferred to some large plant saucers when they were near to walking onto land.  Had to top up the water, provide shade as they will have cooked in the sunshine, and fed with boiled cabbage, kale or other green stuff. I got a few froglets.  two or three years ago I picked up some spawn from someone in SE22 who had a whole nursery, numerous ponds, in their back garden.

Never seen any baby newts or spawn, maybe have ten or more, but I know they go roaming.

I have a very small garden with a "pond" in an old Belfast sink and a couple of other small water containers used by birds and sometimes frogs.

I have had frogspawn,  but it usually gets eaten by something (no idea what. Cats?)  though I have had tadpoles and froglets in the past.

I had never seen any newts until a couple of years ago when I opened the door of my tiny shed and found a pile of eggs just inside and a newt hastily scarpering out of a hole at the back of the shed.

The eggs  must have only just been laid. Had I not seen the newt, I would have had no idea what they were. It seems a strange place to lay them.

Sadly they didn't come to anything, they just sort of dried up.

Malumbu, I would like some of your frogspawn if you have any to spare?  Or if anybody else has any?

Edited March 11 by Sue

[Sue]

I have a wood pigeon picking up sticks in my garden, presumably for a nest.

Unfortunately the nest cannot be coming on very fast, as s/he keeps dropping the sticks 🙄🤣

[sunbob]

In my childhood home I remember wood pigeons attempting to make a nest on the TV ariel each year! 

[Sue]

1 hour ago, sunbob said:

In my childhood home I remember wood pigeons attempting to make a nest on the TV ariel each year! 

That must have done wonders for the TV reception!

I once watched a pair of birds, can't remember what they were, don't think they were pigeons, dismantling an old nest twig by twig and rebuilding it a few trees down 🤣

I suppose it was a handy source of sticks, but it seemed rather pointless given there was a nest already there. Maybe it was in poor condition or something?

Edited 11 hours ago by Sue

[vladi]

Yesterday I watched a pair of crows in a sycamore tree at the end of our garden  and they were pecking at the branches. After some time I noticed they were removing the bark. They were taking the bark off in strips. When one of them got a length of about six inches he/she would fly off and return later.  Short pieces would be discarded until a decent length was stripped off. 
I raised the topic with ChatGPT and it confirmed that crows prefer pliable strips of bark for use in building their nests. They seemingly are quite particular about the flexibility of the strips and use these to intertwine with twigs and grass stems to make their nests.  

[malumbu]

Hope wood pigeons are better nest builders than their rat cousins.  We had a feral pigeon nest on a window ledge in a central London office; just a pile of sticks.  

I've left some hair out in a feeder I got from the hairdressers for the birds as nest material.  Last year I got wool from the horniman sheep that all went.  

[Sue]

7 minutes ago, malumbu said:

Hope wood pigeons are better nest builders than their rat cousins.  We had a feral pigeon nest on a window ledge in a central London office; just a pile of sticks.  

I've left some hair out in a feeder I got from the hairdressers for the birds as nest material.  Last year I got wool from the horniman sheep that all went.  

Great ideas!

[Peckhamgatecrasher]

This is rather twee, but quite a good idea:

 

https://shop.nationaltrust.org.uk/woolie-the-sheep-with-bird-nesting-wool.html