Where are all my small wild birds gone?

Yes please Sheal ,they will love it down here it’s much warmer and dryer.

 

I used to see greenfinches a lot way back in the 70s early 80s, not seen one since then.
About a year ago I stopped feeding general
wild bird seed, and now I just feed fat balls and sunflower hearts.

The sparrows still come, but dont just drag the seed out the feeders to get at only the particular seed they want.
And I get more various types of tit and these, finches I guess, but not that common around here until now.
Not a good picture and probably pretty common elsewhere.

 

Not sure they will. The climate here is similar to the one @Sheal has, and we too have many different kinds. Too many in some ways, its getting dangerous to go outside!

I wonder if it has anything to do with pollution of global warming that there seems to be more in what we normally think of as colder climes?

Taken a few days ago (not by me!)...

 

Can’t see many bluetits .

 

They are only seen here on the beaches in winter...

 

Lots of skylarking around, going on here.

Are they goldfinches?

 

We used to have skylarks just down the road, you could always hear them but hard to see, then the field got a change in ownership and in went corn, skylarks are still about but they keep moving around, so allways very hard to hear them, but this year haven't hear a single one, hopefully they're still about

 

What sort of feed are you using? I've always found peanuts and niger seed or sunflower hearts best for finches and tits, they seem to be less popular with the bigger species that beat them up for food! I also find the feeders in the trees get far more visits from the smaller birds than the one on the front garden which is far more open. Where do you all get your food from? I've been shopping around for a while for one place that does everything at a decent quality, I end up going to loads of different places to buy mine as the quality varies so much from place to place! The birds definitely know the difference and scowl at me when I buy something that's not to their taste... I'm sure of it! I've had a lot of hedge sparrows from across the road and a bunch of wagtails this year but not so many of the others :( possibly the Bengal next door scaring them off?

 

We have 30 plus sparrows, 50 plus starlings, two blackbirds, two robins, two wrens, four doves, two blue tits, two great tits, two magpies, two crows, four chaffinch and several dunnock. Only seen one goldfinch this year ( but I did have to remove the niger seed as it sprouted everywhere ) so that may be why they didn't come. Only seen two Swallows so far. A friend told me that swallow numbers have plummeted as people in greece and italy are killing them

@Lucy Williams I find that all the birds love suet pellets - great for the little birds as bite sized and they can just grab it and go.

 

Noticeable drop in the number of small birds around me this winter - mostly down to the Red Kites which appear to be taking over ! Putting the feeders near the prickly hedge seemed to be appreciated & I have at least three nests in there this year so things should settle down. Now I need to do something about the squirrels emptying the feeders in a couple of hours...