View Full Version : Pests and cuties!
I have a wee family of field mice who nest every year under a half barrel planter in my garden..we adjoin a greenfield site.
For the past 3 days the adult mice have been running across the garden, gathering materials for a nest and running back..this is repeated almost every 30 seconds despite my neighbours 3 cats.
I don't like mice.but I admire these wee guys!
We are a little arbitrary in assessing who and what is cute.
Any joys unfolding in your garden this Spring?:D
I'm feeling particularly sorry at the moment for 'our' pair of Jackdaws who have for the last three years managed to nest in our chimney and block it each time before OH has thought about getting a chimney pot cover sorted! Why sorry? Well this year he's got it sorted and the poor birdies can't understand why they can't get in the chimney. Anyway, don't worry they've moved on to the old chimney on the bothy, so baby Jackdaws will no doubt be arriving soon.
I'm feeling particularly sorry at the moment for 'our' pair of Jackdaws who have for the last three years managed to nest in our chimney and block it each time before OH has thought about getting a chimney pot cover sorted! Why sorry? Well this year he's got it sorted and the poor birdies can't understand why they can't get in the chimney. Anyway, don't worry they've moved on to the old chimney on the bothy, so baby Jackdaws will no doubt be arriving soon.
God to hear rupert!
The Housemartins across the road from us are in for a nasty shock this year....polystyrene foam.:~(
It is so nice to greet the same creatures..birds or mammals..year after year.
I have a fantastic Hedgehog family that daunder in to our family BBQ's.. All summer..every year at 10 oclock.
..special!:D
Hi,
I have a hare. Naturally she's my own personal hare. I won't see her till later on as she seems to have a form in the field just behind our fence and in summer you can see her zigzagging back to it in the evening for her 2 Minutes a Day Attention to Babies Routine. I saw her or Mr Hare yesterday and see them periodically though through the winter.
Hares are the best. My all-time favourites. Hares Rule!
Kevin Milkins
08-Apr-08, 23:41
Wife went into back yard on a nice day last week to consider planting up containers. she lifted a container and a little mouse run out. although she aint no fan of mice she respects that they have to nest somewere and have left this tub alone. How nice
Shabbychic
09-Apr-08, 00:06
We had a problem with some resident crows pinching the bird balls we put out for the wee birds. Now we have come to an arrangement with them. If we throw scraps out for the crows they leave the bird balls alone.
Have also found that some wee mice also enjoy the bird balls. It's amazing watching them balancing and swinging on the balls.
Kevin Milkins
09-Apr-08, 01:35
Its semms strange that they have a pecking order. We put out all sorts for the birds and we get a range from seagulls, crows ,starlings , sparrows, wagtails ,robins , and even a pair of ring neck doves..They all seem to be able to have a snack at some stage.
Sapphire2803
09-Apr-08, 15:47
We have a buzzard who visits us sometimes, he is pretty impressive looking, we had 'our' robin who lived in the hedge near the kitchen window and it was due to him that our cats are now wearing collars with bells, but he seems to have disappeared in the recent cold weather, despite me putting food out for him. :( Maybe one of the neighbours cats got him. Our outbuildings were full of mice and rats when we moved in, luckily the cats have made a big difference. We get swifts and starlings nesting in the eaves of the sheds and martins too I think. During the summer if you walk into the coal shed or the old cow byre you have to watch yourself, you get dive bombed! :lol:
Can someone tell me though, what is the bird that you hear in the evenings round here, sounds a bit like a ray gun lol. I've never seen it, but we hear it every day.
Oh, we've got frogs in our pond too, one got in the house last year and I tried picking it up to put it out. I discovered that while I like frogs and could watch them all day, I can't pick them up. It makes me do a funny dance round the house flapping my arms about. I felt such a fool!!
But anyhoo... mice, when you have them around on the scale we did are just pests. Having said that, I have to admit, they are cute pests. So maybe it's not either/or, just both.
Kevin Milkins
09-Apr-08, 17:14
We have a buzzard who visits us sometimes, he is pretty impressive looking, we had 'our' robin who lived in the hedge near the kitchen window and it was due to him that our cats are now wearing collars with bells, but he seems to have disappeared in the recent cold weather, despite me putting food out for him. :( Maybe one of the neighbours cats got him. Our outbuildings were full of mice and rats when we moved in, luckily the cats have made a big difference. We get swifts and starlings nesting in the eaves of the sheds and martins too I think. During the summer if you walk into the coal shed or the old cow byre you have to watch yourself, you get dive bombed! :lol:
Can someone tell me though, what is the bird that you hear in the evenings round here, sounds a bit like a ray gun lol. I've never seen it, but we hear it every day.
Oh, we've got frogs in our pond too, one got in the house last year and I tried picking it up to put it out. I discovered that while I like frogs and could watch them all day, I can't pick them up. It makes me do a funny dance round the house flapping my arms about. I felt such a fool!!
But anyhoo... mice, when you have them around on the scale we did are just pests. Having said that, I have to admit, they are cute pests. So maybe it's not either/or, just both.
The bird that sounds like a ray gun and are plentyfull in these parts could be the Lapwing.
It sounds like a pee weet noise that gives them there nick name.
Sapphire2803
09-Apr-08, 17:17
The bird that sounds like a ray gun and are plentyfull in these parts could be the Lapwing.
It sounds like a pee weet noise that gives them there nick name.
No, we've got the peewits too :D I was told once what the ray gun bird was called, but I forgot, so now it bugs me even more.
It almost sounds like the red indian battle cry thingy in the old films.
Ooh! This is so hard to describe!
No, we've got the peewits too :D I was told once what the ray gun bird was called, but I forgot, so now it bugs me even more.
It almost sounds like the red indian battle cry thingy in the old films.
Ooh! This is so hard to describe!
Could it be a Snipe that you are hearing, they have a weird whirring/drumming sort of noise (also very difficult to describe!).
northener
09-Apr-08, 22:36
No, we've got the peewits too :D I was told once what the ray gun bird was called, but I forgot, so now it bugs me even more.
It almost sounds like the red indian battle cry thingy in the old films.
Ooh! This is so hard to describe!
Curlew, methinks. They tend to call when they are gliding in to land. There's a lot coming in now to nest in Caithness at this time of the year.
.
Best moment for this 'city gal'...snipes and curlews.
What could be better?
NickInTheNorth
09-Apr-08, 22:56
Hi,
I have a hare. Naturally she's my own personal hare. I won't see her till later on as she seems to have a form in the field just behind our fence and in summer you can see her zigzagging back to it in the evening for her 2 Minutes a Day Attention to Babies Routine. I saw her or Mr Hare yesterday and see them periodically though through the winter.
Hares are the best. My all-time favourites. Hares Rule!
Tilter
If you wished to share (in general terms) where I might be able to see a hare or two, and show them to my kids I would be eternally grateful. Hares are my absolute favourite british mammal, and I haven't seen any for years.
I also understand if you prefer not to share.
Any joys unfolding in your garden this Spring?:D
I have 2 cats (think they are from a nearby farm), they come all year round though. 3 wild rabbits - 2 brown & 1 silver & a number of baby rabbits under the shed. 9 Grouse come for a feed twice a day (1 male & 8 females). Little Robbie robin, plenty of all sorts of other small birdies & the Starlings are now here. Also not forgetting our residential Scorrie. The grass is starting to grow so it's nearly time to get the mower out, time to check for the frogs that hide out in the grass - we had one that got into the house last year, had to get hubby to pick it up & put it back outside. :lol:
Tilter
If you wished to share (in general terms) where I might be able to see a hare or two, and show them to my kids I would be eternally grateful. Hares are my absolute favourite british mammal, and I haven't seen any for years.
I also understand if you prefer not to share.
Nick,
I think your kids would get very bored standing around for days waiting for a glimpse. I just catch sight of them occasionally when I'm in the kitchen looking out of the window. And you'll never see them in a field where there's other animals. I'll PM you but I think they're probably all over Caithness.
I'm so glad you're mad about hares too. Did you read Philip Pullman's trilogy? I'd want a hare for a daemon like the balloonist.
Sapphire2803
09-Apr-08, 23:34
Yay! With the help of the org I now have a name for the ray gun bird.
Thank you Rupert, it is a snipe.
For anyone who is now curious as to what it sounds like, you can hear it here (http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/birdguide/name/s/snipe/index.asp)
you have to listen to the end to hear the noise I was talking about.
We do get curlews in the next field, I was watching them last year.
Whitewater
09-Apr-08, 23:48
Been reading through all your posts, thing that worries me is the lapwings, or perhaps I should say, lack of them. I used to walk our dog on a certain route, (5 miles round trip) and at this time of year it was always a steady confrontation between her and the lapwings, but now we see no birds. Where have they all gone.? Perhaps it is just imagination, but I don't think so. They simply are not there. Has this happened to other species? Or just to the lapwings, or as we used to call them "shochads"
Been reading through all your posts, thing that worries me is the lapwings, or perhaps I should say, lack of them. I used to walk our dog on a certain route, (5 miles round trip) and at this time of year it was always a steady confrontation between her and the lapwings, but now we see no birds. Where have they all gone.? Perhaps it is just imagination, but I don't think so. They simply are not there. Has this happened to other species? Or just to the lapwings of as we used to call them "shochads"
I've heard their decline is to do with farming methods. Sileage is used more than hay now and grass is cut for sileage sooner than when it's cut for hay and it interferes rather nastily with the lapwings' nesting time.
(Thanks - now I know how to spell shochad.)
Yay! With the help of the org I now have a name for the ray gun bird.
Thank you Rupert, it is a snipe.
For anyone who is now curious as to what it sounds like, you can hear it here (http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/birdguide/name/s/snipe/index.asp)
I was wondering what a ray gun sounded like. (What's a ray gun?)
Kevin Milkins
10-Apr-08, 00:10
Hi Whitwater
There are a lot of lapwings up towards Reiss beech and they will get nasty if a dog goes near the nest.
Kevin Milkins
10-Apr-08, 00:15
I was wondering what a ray gun sounded like. (What's a ray gun?)
Its a gun that sounds just like a Snipe.
I thought everybody knew that.
Sapphire2803
10-Apr-08, 00:29
There are loads of lapwings here, there was one peewitting it's head off outside the window just now :D
I was wondering what a ray gun sounded like. (What's a ray gun?)
Didn't you watch Flash Gordon when you were a kid? It's a laser death ray thingy used by the bad guys.
Its a gun that sounds just like a Snipe.
I thought everybody knew that.
And that too :lol:
Kevin Milkins
10-Apr-08, 10:48
There are loads of lapwings here, there was one peewitting it's head off outside the window just now
Didn't you watch Flash Gordon when you were a kid? It's a laser death ray thingy used by the bad guys.
And that too :lol:
I was trying to think of Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers kept popping into my head.
Anyway I must cut on as I am love and have only 27 min to save the world. lol
Didn't you watch Flash Gordon when you were a kid? It's a laser death ray thingy used by the bad guys.
No I didn't Sapphy - deprived childhood, hole in the road and all that. Thanks for the explanation.
Sapphire2803
11-Apr-08, 20:52
No I didn't Sapphy - deprived childhood, hole in the road and all that. Thanks for the explanation.
You think you were deprived?
I had to get up in the morning at ten o'clock at night half an hour before I went to bed, drink a cup of sulphuric acid, work twenty-nine hours a day down mill, and pay mill owner for permission to come to work, and when we got home, our Dad and our mother would kill us and dance about on our graves singing Hallelujah
northener
11-Apr-08, 21:09
You think you were deprived?
I had to get up in the morning at ten o'clock at night half an hour before I went to bed, drink a cup of sulphuric acid, work twenty-nine hours a day down mill, and pay mill owner for permission to come to work, and when we got home, our Dad and our mother would kill us and dance about on our graves singing Hallelujah
We never had Snipe when I were a kid. We had to throw a rock in the air and make ray-gun noises ourselves.
And you try tellin' kids terday that, an they won't believe yer.
We never had Snipe when I were a kid. We had to throw a rock in the air and make ray-gun noises ourselves.
And you try tellin' kids terday that, an they won't believe yer.
That's what it was all aboot!:roll:
Sapphire2803
11-Apr-08, 21:18
We never had Snipe when I were a kid. We had to throw a rock in the air and make ray-gun noises ourselves.
And you try tellin' kids terday that, an they won't believe yer.
They won't!
I knew you wouldn't let me down Northerner :lol:
Thing is..kids of yesteryear were missing a much more important thing!
No Northener,,and where's the point in that?;)
You think you were deprived?
I had to get up in the morning at ten o'clock at night half an hour before I went to bed, drink a cup of sulphuric acid, work twenty-nine hours a day down mill, and pay mill owner for permission to come to work, and when we got home, our Dad and our mother would kill us and dance about on our graves singing Hallelujah
Maybe you're my long-lost sister and I don't know it. You could have been at t'mill while I was snuggled up in bed with my sulphuric acid and vice versa, and we never got to meet.
Further to my earlier post about the Jackdaws - oh dear, I feel really awful now. I thought they had moved on to the Bothy chimney pot which is a perfectly good des res, but its obviously too down market or they've been hit by the credit crunch and can't get a mortgage, cos they are back on the house chimney with sticks laying them next to the covered chimney pot. Maybe, there won't be any baby Jacks after all. Does anyone know if they will nest in a building or such like or do they need a chimney?
Hi rupert,
They prefer chimmneys or 'holes' in masonary but can also be persuaded to nest in trees with dense folliage such as conifers.
I am sure they will prove resillient enough to sort something out...even without the aid of Phil Spencer and Kirsty Allsop!;)
Good luck
kx
I have a cat free garden with a small area of trees in one corner and am becoming seriously concerned by the overcrowding, in fact am expecting a delegation of sparrows any day now to complain. The population explosion last year was something else so if they do a repeat performance this year I can't think where they're all going to live. Went out the other day and one bush was so covered in sparrows I could hardly see the bush. Then there's all the finches of various kinds.
Frogs here and there to avoid with the lawnmower - no-one seems to have taught them the Green Cross code.
Then there's all the voles - so many in one patch I'm amazed the ground doesn't just collapse if the number of holes is anything to go by. Must be like the London underground down there.
Would love more hedgehogs but just see the odd one occasionally. They are my absolute favourite :)
Thanks Karia, hope they sort themselves out too. Jackdaws are so clever (usually) and fun to watch.
I have a cat free garden with a small area of trees in one corner and am becoming seriously concerned by the overcrowding, in fact am expecting a delegation of sparrows any day now to complain. The population explosion last year was something else so if they do a repeat performance this year I can't think where they're all going to live. Went out the other day and one bush was so covered in sparrows I could hardly see the bush. Then there's all the finches of various kinds.
Frogs here and there to avoid with the lawnmower - no-one seems to have taught them the Green Cross code.
Then there's all the voles - so many in one patch I'm amazed the ground doesn't just collapse if the number of holes is anything to go by. Must be like the London underground down there.
Would love more hedgehogs but just see the odd one occasionally. They are my absolute favourite :)
You lucky thing Badger!
Our garden was created by us to be 'wildlife friendly' and it is wonderful.
OH needs a complete blackout in order to sleep but when he is nightshift I often leave the blinds open ( we are not overlooked!) and the amount of activity in a seemingly quiet night is fantastic.Foxes, hedgehogs, owls, frogs dormice.... and badgers!
Something really precious about those nocturnal moments spent with your garden....not much fun when ye oversleep in the morning mind.:D
Are there badgers in Caithness then? I've never seen or heard of a one.
Are there badgers in Caithness then? I've never seen or heard of a one.
I was just wondering that. Very worried about my Welsh relations just now - they call it culling, I call it killing. Wish they could find some other way to solve that problem as I hate to think of those beautiful animals being killed.
Although my garden is cat free, I've sometimes wondered if the house is haunted. When digging the hole to make a little pond for the frogs years ago I came across a box marked RIP Kipper. Of course I left it there but I've sometimes been woken in the night by something that feels like a cat jumping on the duvet - quite heavy. Doesn't keep the mice away though.
Well if it is Kipper jumping on the duvet, nothing to worry about Badger, he's just needing a bit of human company.
Don't know if there are Badgers in Caithness. Unfortunately, the only Badger I have ever seen was one that had been knocked down on the road when I was down south. Amazing creature, bigger than I imagined with powerful claws.
The culling of Badgers is a very controversial subject and I wonder if it will do any good anyway regarding TB in cattle. For those farms that are affected by bovine TB is must be horrendous.
Are there badgers in Caithness then? I've never seen or heard of a one.
I've seen a dead one by the road just leaving Halkirk (by the manse), and someone else spotted a dead one on the other road by Skinnet too, so I guess the answer is yes.
As for jackdaws - they're nesting, as ever, in both of our unused chimneys. We keep forgetting to get covers, and every year, they're back...
We'e also got mice back in the loft - they've had a good old chomp at the spare car seat which was stored up there.
The starlings are, touch wood, not bothering us this year, as MrBurd sealed up all the holies leading into the shed last year. Time will tell whether they're smart enough to find new ways to get in there and poop all over our stuff, grrr.
The rooks are my new pest though - every morning I wake to find my seed feeder knocked to the ground, and empty thanks to these big brutes. And, they're trashing my poor wee rowan tree by perching on it, when it's not strong enough to take their weight, resulting in a multitude of broken branches littering the garden. :(
I'm so excited today................. we've got spiderlings. Millions and zillions of them. I've wasted half my day looking for the magnifying glass and the other half looking at said arachnids. They're in two tight little balls (each about 2 inches across) in a corner of the seed propagator in the greenhouse. Some of the bigger ones (less than 1mm in length) have moved to the outside of the box and are spinning ropes to the bubble wrap on the wall of the greenhouse and motoring up and down. They have golden amber coloured bodies in curled up black legs. A big spider came barrelling out of a dusty old web in the other corner of the propagator and has been keeping a stalky eye on me. Is this Mum? Do spiders hang around to protect their offspring?
Weeburd thanks for the info on badgers.
I'm so excited today................. we've got spiderlings. Millions and zillions of them. I've wasted half my day looking for the magnifying glass and the other half looking at said arachnids. They're in two tight little balls (each about 2 inches across) in a corner of the seed propagator in the greenhouse. Some of the bigger ones (less than 1mm in length) have moved to the outside of the box and are spinning ropes to the bubble wrap on the wall of the greenhouse and motoring up and down. They have golden amber coloured bodies in curled up black legs. A big spider came barrelling out of a dusty old web in the other corner of the propagator and has been keeping a stalky eye on me. Is this Mum? Do spiders hang around to protect their offspring?
Weeburd thanks for the info on badgers.
Tilter, have you considered how 'cute' they will be when they are all as big as mamma spider?
Keep the doors and windows locked or it sounds like you'll be living in the greenhouse while they enjoy the 'run' ( and I mean that literally!) of your house.:eek:
Seriously.. well done for finding them fascinating and 'cute'...not sure I could.:D
Seriously.. well done for finding them fascinating and 'cute'...not sure I could.:D
Do you really think I'm weird then?
Definitely not Tilter. I am a huge spider fan and have never found any at all scary, no matter how big. In our old house we had a huge spider that lived behind the window frame in the bathroom called 'George'. I wonder if he is still there, how long do spiders live for? Hope he hasn't been squashed by the new residents.
Update on my pesky Jackdaws (only cos they are causing me worry - pathetic I know) - saw the two of them going down into the Bothy chimney pot this morning, must be an awful squash in there with them both. No more sticks have appeared on the house chimney so hopefully they've got the message and moved on. When OH had to unblock the house chimney last year their nest was at least five feet down the chimney and they had lined it with sheep's wool from our neighbour's land - so clever.
Do you really think I'm weird then?
Not at all Tilter......I think you are really really lucky!:)
Kx
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