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Does anyone else like starlings?

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  • BijdezeeBijdezee Posts: 1,484
    Sadly, we never get any starlings here. We have plenty of jackdaws and wood pigeons though.

    I like the cheeping of the house sparrows, they're always busy chattering or taking dust baths. 
  • FlyDragonFlyDragon Posts: 834
    I don't mind starlings at all, I only see them when the mealworms go out on a tray and then they descend en masse and the mealworms are gone in about 5 minutes. 

    There's a magpie who's a regular visitor at the moment with a bad leg, it hops about on one but I have a soft spot for it because its coping admirably and its very clever at divebombing the feeders and then sweeping up what falls out.  The dopey wood pigeons would never figure that out! 
  • Hostafan1Hostafan1 Posts: 34,888
    Not a fan of starlings. We're invaded by them in winter when they hang around the local dairy farm's cow sheds. 
    They bully the little birds off the feeders. 
    I have  a particular loathing of magpies
    Devon.
  • josusa47josusa47 Posts: 3,530
    So how many versions of a woodpigeon's call can we collect?  I've never heard the two above.  I always thought it was "Take two cows, Taffy."

    I don't think gulls are popular anywhere: noise, mess, ripping open bin bags, stealing chips, eating food put out for more engaging wildlife.  Here in Llandudno we have a large population of herring gulls, which nationally are in decline.  Every now and then someone writes to the paper complaining about them and wanting them culled.  This letter always evokes the same two replies:  1.  They can't be culled, they're a protected species; 2.  If you don't like gulls, don't live at the seaside.

    We also have more jackdaws than I've seen anywhere else.  I had to take down the hanging suet block feeder because the neighbours complained (nicely) about jackdaw poop on their clean washing.  The jackdaws loved the suet block, but used next door's washing line as a queuing space while waiting their turn.
  • PurpleRosePurpleRose Posts: 538
    I love all the birdy visitors although I have a few different favourites. Starlings are one of my faves, they are little characters.  This year they have been nesting in next door but one's (new) roof. One of the adults who we have named Steve sits outside our kitchen window most mornings and as soon as he spots me starts his starling swark.  He knows I will be out with meals worms and suet pellets.

     We were laughing at him one morning as I filled the bird table and went in, he wont feed until I go inside but in the meantime half a dozen jackdows swooped down and started eating. He flew over, tried to find a way in, he got amongst them and flapped his wings. The Jackdows flew off. All the other starlings came down and had their breakfast. I would love for it to happen again so I could film it but alas it has  not happened since
  • ObelixxObelixx Posts: 30,064
    We have starlings here but sporadically.  Just a week or so ago I inadvertently frightened off a flock of 30 or so helping themselves to the yellow cherries in a tree behind a barn.  Insipid fruit so the birds are welcome.   They tend to flock and perch along the leccy wires that run across our paddock to the farm behind and in the trees along the boundary.  Occasionally small groups land and inspect the dry, gravelled patch behind us presumably looking for seeds or insects.  Entertaining.

    Magpies are no worse than other corvids at predating songbird nests and rather more handsome than crows.  Less noisy too.

    Our plot is surrounded by mixed hedges and trees, has lots of wild areas and grass left uncut to allow wildflowers to grow and we keep the feeders stocked up all year yet not a huge variety of birds, tho growing numbers of the ones we do have.  No blackbirds or thrushes, no flycatchers or tree creepers, no spotted woodpeckers.
    Vendée - 20kms from Atlantic coast.
    "The price good men (and women) pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men (and women)."
    Plato
  • SkandiSkandi Posts: 1,723
    I loath blackbirds, purely because they eat every berry before it gets a chance to ripen, I don't mind them in spring or winter when they are hopping around on the lawn murdering worms. I don't mind Jackdaws and I really like swifts even though I can't really use my outside freezer right now as they have set up a nest right next to it, and I feel bad disturbing her. They are lovely to watch skimming over the barley, even better when I think about how many flies they eat!
  • strelitzia32strelitzia32 Posts: 758
    We have starlings nesting in the roof every year, they turn up in Feb and usually off by early May. They sit on the roof line and shout if we open the windows. Every year we can hear the chicks in the roof getting louder each week. And one of them has worked out how to get in the house whenever he wants, no idea how...

  • PyraPyra Posts: 152
    I'm glad I'm not the only one who likes the little buggers! :D 

    @Fairygirl I'm with you with the seagulls. @josusa47 that amuses me too, they're so funny, you'd think the fledglings never get fed! We have 4 or 5 nesting pairs who have taught all their young that our birdfeeders are good. So now I have to keep feeding them. 

    @AnniD that Scruffy is gorgeous!! 
  • a1154a1154 Posts: 1,108
    I don’t recall ever having starlings here (south scotland) before last year when we did have 1 family. This year I have had a nest in my garage roof and one in my living room wood burner chimney.
    The ones in the roof, it’s hard to describe, but the birds are too big to fly directly into the nest. They had to land on the roof and then hop or scramble up to it. This was quite funny as they got it wrong lots of times, and slipped down, lots of squawking and flapping. 
    The youngsters in the chimney fell down in 5 times. 4 were successfully rescued (sorry number 3) and they don’t half make a racket when you grab them wearing rubber gloves and release them at the door. They have been noisy, messy and entertaining. 

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