Bl**dy Fieldfare

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Brian
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Last few days I've been going heavy on the bird food as the grounds covered in snow, I started off with a couple of sheets of ply laid on the snow but the wind just blew the food off, it either disappeared beneath surrounding snow or just gone in the wind. I brought my builders spot thing in which is plastic, around 3' diameter and has a lip 2" high all round, high enough to deflect the wind over and leave the food still there, so this is now placed on the snow and a healthy layer of food covering it. Two days ago a Fieldfare moved into the middle of the board and will not let anything else near it? it hates Blackbirds but stops all from feeding, I have chased it off, it comes back, the dogs chased it off, it comes back, it's there from first light till dark when the rats come out to finish off what's left [we live in the countryside, you feed birds, you get rats].

I know all birds are hungry except this one because he won't leave, we had another Fieldfare come to the garden and he viciously attacked that.

Any suggestions, I have a lot of regular bird visitors to my garden that are all going hungry because of this individual.
 
That's nature I guess, survival of the fittest and all that.

I would take it away for a while in the hope the bird will find a new patch
 
That's nature I guess, survival of the fittest and all that.

I would take it away for a while in the hope the bird will find a new patch


Air rifle ? :D
 
Air rifle ? :D

Since you brought up shooting :

The firearms act is as big as yellow pages now and nobody much even bothers shooting at all now.

I live in rural Wales and there are rabbits running all over the B roads now causing serious risk to drivers who try to swerve them.

Even with legal air guns the laws have gone worse.

In Scotland I'm sure they have to licence the weak legal air guns now or face up to 2 years in jail.
 
I have a similar situation except that a Blackbird is trying to dominate the food and spends a lot of its time chasing the Fieldfares away, it ignores the smaller birds. I have only had Fiedlfares in the garden over the last few days, they usually live in the fields, it's just the intense cold that has driven them to the feeders.

It's interesting to watch the group dynamics as they fight for food. The only birds that don't suffer harassment here are Nuthatch and Woodpeckers.

Chris
 
I’ve got four Fieldfares, one has been chasing absolutely everything away today after I put apple out. Yesterday it was only chasing other Fieldfares, but today I only had a couple of Goldfinches on the feeders. Shortly after lunch a single Starling came down, looked the Fieldfare in the eyes and started eating, suddenly the rest of Starling Squadron, Blackbirds, Woodpigeon etc were back and it sporadically chased the other Fieldfares. According to my bird books Fieldfares are sociable birds!
 
I split the food back up onto the two boards I used previously and placed them about 15' apart, he's still trying to keep it all for himself but losing the battle:)

Might add my one loves banana he scoff's it down like there's no tomorrow!
 
Some of the larger thrush species such as mistle thrush and fieldfares can get very territorial over food, particularly in freezing weather conditions. We had a sad incident at the start of the winter round at Mum's house; a mistle thrush had taken up territory and was guarding some rose hips, flying aggressively at any bird that came near them, even having a go at his own reflection in the garage window below the pergola where the rose hips were.

His obsession with guarding his food seemed to grow by the day, until finally we heard a loud bang and found the poor thing lying dead on the step outside the French window. He must have seen his own reflection and flown at full speed to attack the 'intruder', breaking his neck when he hit the glass. It seems there's a fine line between survival of the fittest and natural selection.
 
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I think theres a plan to licence airguns in England and Wales too, don't know the details though.
 
Two separate feeding areas. You will always get this problem with one feeding area whether it's Fieldfare, Robin or Blackbird.
 
I find the bigger birds don't tend to stay long anyway. A brief visit then they are off elsewhere, Jackdaws and starlings I'm thinking. Did have a Mistle-thrush and a couple of Redwings visit, but they went fairly quickly tho'
 
I have a female black cap doing the same thing. Not even feeding a lot of the time, just sitting in the shrub above the feeders chasing everything else off. Thankfully there's so many of us here feed the birds that 'my' birds will just go to my enighbours' feeders and leave Mrs black cap to it. She's only come in because of the snow.
 
Female blackcap here in my garden too enjoying the insect flavoured fat candle, but it seems to be sharing nicely with the blackbirds, LTTs, blue tits, dunnocks, etc.
 
Haven't seen a Fieldfare here but have heard from 2 friends in more rural locations who have had exactly the same problem with them. Here, they're all sharing nicely, although there are squabbles between members of the same species.
 
The fieldfares arrived in our garden last week for the first time , the resident blackbird gave up as he was outnumbered but when the Magpie showed up which he always does it was game over.
 
Spread the food around in 5 different locations , It cant defend all of them at the same time
 
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