TINY TUESDAY

It’s been a long day already!  I went to bed and eventually got to sleep at about 1.00 a.m. only to find that at 5.30 a.m. I was wide awake.  I decided to get up at 5.50 and set up my tripod in the conservatory so that I could watch the Great Tits feeding.

It was freezing cold and I could hardly feel my fingers, so was glad to have a remote release cable for my camera.  However, after standing there for about half an hour, I was so cold that Mr. HCB insisted I came indoors and had a coffee to warm up.  I think he's glad he's not going to cricket today!

I was soon back out with my fleece and warm scarf on to see if I could find some tiny flowers in the garden.  We had noticed that the Great Tits were going down onto our various Aquilegias, that seem to like our soil and grow very well, but only when I took several photographs did I realise why - they are covered in green fly, so a good feeding ground for the birds.  Of course, they also like the fatballs, sunflower hearts and peanuts that we put out and the Great Tit that I have put in as an extra today is on some very old peanuts, but was obviously having a good feed.

I guess whilst the Great Tits are feeding young - and when I got close to the new feeding box that a friend made for us and Mr. HCB put up earlier in the year, I could hear them - I won’t do anything about getting rid of the greenfly - and after all, they are still God’s creatures - not that Mr. HCB will be happy to have them on any of his vegetables.

As Mr. HCB has just said to me, we get so much pleasure from watching the birds in our garden and it brings a calmness to us, not that we are that stressed - but it’s certainly saved me from doing lots of housework this morning!  

We’ve seen Gold Finches, Blackbirds, Long-tailed Tits, Great Tits, Blue Tits, Dunnocks, a Robin, lots of Sparrows and a dear old Pigeon that comes to “hoover” up the bits that the other birds drop. Not bad for a “town” garden.

“I don't feed the birds 
     because they need me; 
I feed the birds 
     because I need them.” 
Kathi Hutton