Wildlife Garden: A lot in a week.

Activity in the garden is beginning to increase. My visiting Hedgehog is still asleep in the hog house although she did pop out for a bite to eat two evenings this week. I missed her both times on the camera as she was only coming out once a night and very early (8pm)

In the previous entry I included a picture of the male Grey Wagtail that visits each day. In that picture he was in his winter plumage. Below he's changing into his summer plumage. You can tell a male Grey Wagtail by the black throat feathers.

On Thursday 3rd March I noticed a second Grey Wagtail fly over the garden and call to the male. The second bird later appeared in the garden.

This was a female Grey Wagtail. The difference is in the throat feathers. The females throat feathers only go grey and not black like the male. So I have both male and female Grey Wagtails visiting. Hopefully this means that I will have baby Grey Wagtails for the third year running.

The Blue Tit's are still visiting the nestbox each day. No nest building yet. Looking at my notes for 2010 nest building started on 23rd March.

Foxes are in as usual. They have even managed to share the food without fighting. They have also been arriving early. Three times I went out with the food for them to find one of the foxes at the entrance to the garden waiting. She ran away as soon as she saw me which is exactly as I want. It is important that foxes don't associate people with food.

Flowers are beginning to appear in the garden. There are a few snowdrops out. There should be more but the visiting squirrel has been through my flower pots and dug them up.