If you live in the UK or northern Europe, do you ever see any exotic birds in your garden or general area ?

[IndigoSpritz]

I'm in Leeds and I'm told there are wild parakeets living in nearby Bradford. I've yet to see any where I am; in fact, I was surprised to learn they lived this far north. The most colourful bird I've seen (and heard) recently is a greenfinch - not many of those round here. And a greater spotted woodpecker in the country park nearby. I've heard the green woodpeckers call but never seen one. I would like to see a parakeet - I appreciate they're not native and potentially harmful.

@rangerlady it's amazing how many 'eagles' we have isn't it, every other fence post in tourist season

IT shows how the definition of exotic can change with geography and time. One of Dhs birding mates paid a shilling in the 60s to see collared doves in someone's garden. I love it when you see waxwings in supermarket car parks. And in Egypt we were amazed to see 20 hoopoe on the lawn under our window. Locals didn't bat an eye.

We live in the SE London / Kent border and we have parakeets in the garden. One local pond has a regular heron, cormorant and mandarin duck and the other has an Egyptian goose

NW here, we get
Blue tits
Great tits
Coat tits
House sparrows
Blackbirds
Robins
Starlings
Wood pigeon
Collared doves
Also a dunnock every now and then and this year I noticed a blackcap on the feeder.

I also regularly see buzzards overhead have seen five together in total. We once had a sparrowhawk perching on the top of next doors trampoline netting, haven't seen it return though.

Collared doves were a permanent fixture at my parents house when I was growing up but here, only 15 miles away, you never ever see them.

A buzzard lives just up the road from us (Scotland). We get the usual garden birds, herons on the river beside us and last year had a parakeet in the garden.

I saw this most amazingly tall bird on Salisbury plain once, it was absolutely huge, no idea what it was, it didn't look like a heron, it was bigger.

We have a green woodpecker in our garden and the sparrow hawk makes a mess of pigeons sometimes, the crows terrorise the dog and have made him bleed attacking him (he weighs 22kg, no small dog!)

I saw an escaped Rhea in Doncaster last year. When I worked in Leeds City Centre, the hawk/falcon used for displays at the Royal Armouries would escape and land on our office window sill a few tones a year. We had his handler’s phone number on the notice board.

It could have been a crane stuck. They are huge.

There are parakeets in Victoria Park in Glasgow apparently but I've never seen them.

It could have been a crane stuck. They are huge.

Does anyone know how far they're spreading since their reintroduction? Afaik that was in the Somerset Levels, but I saw one last year which had found its way back to the estuary by Slimbridge (Which was where they raise the chicks for reintroduction)

However, on Salisbury plain, a huge bird - all over big - might have been a male Great Bustard. Apparently they can be over a metre tall (a heron is about a metre)

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_bustard

Berkshire way here. Other than the ever present rats with wings pigeons we've seen:

Bigger birds:

• Red Kites (so many of them now!)
• Buzzard
• Kestrel
• Sparrowhawk
• Pheasant (the cat doesn't care for birds normally but she was NOT happy to see this on the patio!)

Garden birds:

• Wren (so cute!)
• Dunnocks
• Robins
• Goldfinches (think I had about 10 on my feeders at once one day)
• Chaffinch
• Greenfinch
• Blue tits
• Great tits
• Coal tits
• Green woodpecker (helping himself to lots of ants in my lawn!)
• Great spotted woodpecker
• Blackbirds
• Thrush

We have a couple of Tawny Owls round here too. Never seen them but I've heard them (normally as I'm trying to go to sleep - bloody things!)

What happened to all the sparrows in the UK? I remember as a kid being excited to see a blue tit as all we had were sparrows! The only place I tend to see sparrows now is at tourist attraction cafes!

My mum gets a gaggle of long tailed tits and a few nuthatches too, which I'm quite jealous of.

Re the Cranes - Existing locations in Norfolk Broads, Humberside and Lakenheath Fen, plus the reintroductions on the Somerset levels. I saw a couple outside Slimbridge last year. So presume they do travel.

I'm hoping some find their way up to the Leighton moss area, which has herons, bitterns, spoonbills, egrets (small and sometimes Great Whites), plus occasionally I've heard purple heron and glossy ibis. (Loads of waterfowl, bearded tits, avocets, and otters too)

That would be brilliant if they colonised further north.

Bruffin that's a beautiful picture! I found a baby blue tit hopping around on my patio last week. The next day he was flying around the garden. It doesn't take them long to get airborne.

There's a collared dove nesting in my wisteria at the moment. She comes back every year.

I've had a heron in the garden once, and there's a small flock of long-tailed tits that pass through on their way somewhere every winter. Otherwise mostly blackbirds, robins and blue tits.

Sparrows had a problems with their food source some years back.
If I remember rightly they didn't tend to go in search of food if it meant travelling too far from home.
So when the local food source dried up - they died.
I think they are making a come back though.

OP, Kingfishers are a fabulous sight. It always makes my morning if I see one when I'm out walking doggo. When I saw two at once last month I was 'crowing about it all day, especially when on perched rather than just flashing past!

One of the best sightings I've ever had of a kingfisher was on the Lancaster canal near where it ends in Preston, ie pretty far into a large town.

DH was out for a walk the other day and saw two guineafowl.

I live near rspb rye meads and lea valley. We saw a kingfishers last time we went for a walk at rye meads.
I just bought a superzoom bridge company,cant wait to back and try it out on the kingfishers.
We are also off to brecon beacons soon and going to one if the red kite centres, i am really looking forward to that.

(Shows off)

We had an albino starling for a while. Both common and exotic!

We have had both a jay & a woodpecker in the garden (West Yorkshire). Unfortunately lots of feral pigeons too.

I have seen herons in North Yorkshire. Also saw two massive hares (obviously not birds!) which were the highlight of my journey home one evening.

We get a lot of hares near us, and deer. Re birds there are lots of introduced game birds for the local estate shooting parties so we always have loads of pheasants and partridge trundling about the village and gardens. We also get a lot of owls, at night if you stand outside you can usually hear tawny owls calling to each other and the occasional "scream" of a barn owl. There was a very lost snowy owl on the Norfolk coast last year just up the road from our old house which was quite exotic. I think someone local recently spotted an escaped eagle owl as well.

Our garden backs onto a stream so we often get ducks in the garden. I think they come to visit our domestic hens and ducks. We had 12 on the lawn last week making a huge racket. All other bird visitors are your usual finches, tits, blackbirds & thrushes. We heard a cuckoo recently but I think it was in the community orchard over the back rather than in our garden. I've never seen a cuckoo and would love to. We moved here at the beginning of April so will be interesting to see what bird visitors we get over the winter. I love birds!