We’ve taken part in the RSPB annual bird count for over ten years but this year we nearly missed it. Last Saturday night, Martyn asked if we should have been counting the birds. The count took place from 27 January until 29 January which meant that just left Sunday to squeeze in a count.

For the benefit of those who haven’t heard of the bird count, you are asked to count the highest number of each species of bird, seen from your vantage point, for one hour. We usually watch from our side window which overlooks the bird feeding area so we don’t actually manage to count the total number of birds to visit the garden just the ones that visit this particular part of the garden.

As you can see from the chart below the total number of birds counted has been the same for the past three years. This is half the number that we have counted in some of the previous years. I think one of the reasons is that we have noticed that more people close by are feeding the birds which is a good thing for the bird population but renders a less impressive count.

None of our less frequent visitors showed up this year. There are some species that we only see occasionally. They may visit more often than we realise as we don’t sit looking out of the window every hour of every day. We do know that we regularly have one or two wrens but none showed up during the hour that we were counting. I am also really surprised to note that the greenfinch hasn’t turned up in any of our counts over the years. Greenfinches are regular visitors but must be shy on the days that we are counting.

For the benefit of any overseas visitors, I have included photos of the species counted. The photos were not taken during the count.

The chart below – click on the image for a larger view – shows that the numbers of some species have fluctuated over the years whereas the numbers of other species have been fairly stable.

The species that have fluctuated the most are house sparrows and goldfinches. I don’t think that this represents a fall in numbers more that the birds flit around so much that they are difficult to count. Birds tend to wait in the trees and bushes until there is space on the feeders. Our feeders hang from our magnolia tree which was severely pruned last year which has meant that there were fewer perching places. This year birds waited in bushes around the corner of the house out of sight and just dashed onto the feeders to grab some seed. The speed at which the birds arrived suggested that there was a constant stream of different individuals. 

The doughnut chart below shows the proportion of each species counted.

When you have entered the results of the count onto the RSPB website a chart is generated  that shows your top ten species,

These can be compared with the top ten species recorded nationally and reflects the count results at that point. This will change as not all the results will have been entered.

The types of birds that we recorded are almost in line with those recorded nationally. We didn’t spot any magpies or long tailed tits during our count although both species visit our garden,

The dunnock and chaffinch feature in our top ten but are missing from the top ten nationally.

Both charts have the house sparrow in the top position but other than that our chart shows no alignment with the national chart. On our chart, I would say that the top five birds are under represented as I am sure that the numbers visiting are far higher than the count suggests.

I also wonder whether the national numbers are skewed somewhat due to misidentification. I know from experience that dunnocks are often mistaken for sparrows as are female chaffinches. Great and blue tits are also often confused.

I also know that our numbers change dramatically at different times of the day and during differing weather conditions.

Regardless of all this, I’m sure that the RSPB make good use of the results and factor any variations into their final reports.

If you took part in the count, how did your results compare with ours and the national results?