Baby Birds

The baby birds are starting to show themselves. The first on the scene were the dunnocks: tiny dark dashes on their heads and bodies, running from front to back. Next were the young blackbirds, newly feathered covered and fluffed out. They are bigger in appearance than their sleek parents, although the adult female is still plucked bare on the back of her head and neck by the efforts of the male to further his genes. I was delighted to see the first young starling. These birds have been rare and infrequent visitors to our garden the last few years. The youngster is sometimes mistaken for a young blackbird due to his mid-brown colour; he has none of the white spots or colourful iridescence of his parents, however. His squawk alone sets him apart from the blackbirds. His bill is different and his gape is also wider and more persistent. I threw out some suet, dried fruit, seed and wet bread. When he was a nestling his mother often chose suet or dried fruit, today she packed her beak with enormous quantities of wet bread and stuffed it down his open beak. After two such helpings, he stood very erect and looked uncomfortable. He watched and waited as she packed her beak again. Although he was opening and closing his beak he was unable to make a sound, so she flew back to the nest to feed his siblings while stayed very upright awaiting her return – an easy prey for the kestrel or the sparrowhawk, but fortunately for him, not today.