Ever since I was little, I’ve always loved birds. There is something about them that captivates me: the sheer variety of species observable from your back garden, their beauty, their behaviour. My Dad and I would go to a park nearby to see mallards on the lake, blue tits in the trees and gulls and crows way up above. Their environmental niches mean that wherever you are, you’ll see a different selection of birds. By water, the obvious ducks and geese, but you can also see birds like herons and cormorants: both majestic and prehistoric in their shape and flight. At home, I live near woodland and fields. Within a mile you’ll see everything from pheasants, to red kites, to gold crests. And the more you see, the more you want to see. It’s addictive. There’s such a sense of achievement when you’re able to identify a bird from far off, even more so when it’s something uncommon. It’s also therapeutic and grounding to sit by a window and watch a flock of long tailed tits flutter about a bird feeder, taking turns, chirping to one another. We are so lucky in the UK that some of our most common birds are really striking. Taking time to appreciate the intricate beauty of a blue tit for example, you will notice its azure blue crown, green and blue wings and yellow breast. Absorbing the colours of birds which we normally miss really gives a sense of mindful reflection on nature in the non-stop world we live in.
Bird-watching became a hobby of mine. And it has stayed with me. I don’t do it as regularly, but I can still identify birds in flight or from far off that I learnt about when I was seven or eight years old. Naturally, when my Dad and I first noticed the RSPB doing their citizen science project called the Big Garden Birdwatch, we jumped at the chance to help a charity by watching birds and recording the species for an hour.
The first time we did the Birdwatch, I was about seven and we lived in London. Our garden was small and concrete-y, so it wasn’t a hotspot for birds. My Dad and I decided to take a ten minute walk down the road to sit in our local park. It was a lovely, crisp and clear winter day and in the hour we saw a wide variety of birds. My personal favourite was the kestrel, which flew into sight in the last few minutes of the hour. We’d never seen one in the park before (or since), so it was a bit of a miracle, just for us on our Big Garden Birdwatch. Almost ten years later, and having moved 50 miles north to Bedfordshire, a similar thing happened. This time we were at a window, looking out to our garden. It had been a relatively quiet hour compared to previous years but, right at the last minute, a kestrel swooped over from behind the house and landed on our back fence. These stories are both taken from an hour, on a weekend in late January: something you’d usually forget. But, because we’d been doing the Birdwatch my dad and I remember those moments to this day. And, whilst I can’t promise you a show-stopping kestrel, I can promise you a relaxing, therapeutic hour of observing your surroundings, away from a screen.
You don’t need to know anything about birds – the RSPB have a handy online tool to help you identify birds, as well as a print-out sheet of the most common garden birds for you to tick off as you see them. The rules are simple:
- Find somewhere comfortable to sit for an hour (between 25th – 27th January)
- Look out for birds: remember to only count as many as you see at one time, or you could be counting the same bird multiple times!
- Submit your results online here.
Happy bird-watching!