Given the short daylight hours and inclement weather, I am addressing the wildlife that might be visiting your gardens at this time of year; some of which you might welcome and encourage and others that you might be less keen on, writes Rippingale nature columnist Ian Misselbrook.
Perhaps the least popular visitor to our gardens is the brown rat. Brown rats were probably introduced to the UK from Asia around 1720. If you regularly feed your garden birds or keep poultry, you are very likely to encounter rats at some point. Contrary to popular belief and despite their association with sewage systems, rats are fastidiously clean animals. They spend a lot of time grooming and cleaning their fur and also indulge in mutual grooming with their relatives.
Muntjac deer. Photo: Ian Misselbrook
Two other mammals which have also been introduced to our islands that are not very popular in our household, are grey squirrels and muntjac deer. The squirrels are particularly adept at destroying our bird feeders; even some of the so called squirrel proof models. If you are fans of James Bond films you will remember the character called Jaws who sported metal teeth. Well, I swear our squirrels also have metal teeth enabling them to chew through the toughest metal bird feeders.
The diminutive muntjac deer enrages my wife by eating the flowers in our wild garden area; especially bluebells, leaving just the stems.
Fieldfare. Photo: Ian Misselbrook
Woodpigeons also annoy me at times by defaecating in our bird baths just after they have been cleaned and filled with fresh water. However, when you look closely at these birds; they are quite attractive.
Collared doves only arrived in the UK in the middle part of the last century, rapidly increased in numbers and expanded northwards. Recently, I estimate that numbers have decreased a little in our area, which I attribute to predation by female sparrowhawks. Collared doves are probably too big to be killed by the smaller male sparrowhawks.
Ian Misselbrook
At this time of year your garden might be the lucky recipient of a Viking invasion. No, not helmeted Norsemen arriving in long boats but members of the thrush family. Blackbirds from Scandinavia augment our resident population, but the real stars are the far more attractive fieldfares and redwings. If you have any apples left, fieldfares and blackbirds will feast on them. Fieldfares and redwings also adore berries and will soon strip a hedgerow. Enjoy these colourful additions to your regular garden birds until the spring when they will return to northern Europe.