Where are all the birds in my garden?

[blackheartsgirl]

its very odd, I’m awake at the crack of dawn often and the birds are usually very vocal and very welcome, I used to get a huge flock of jackdaws flying over every single day at dawn and dusk. No birds on the feeders or in the garden anymore,

I miss them. And it’s only been this summer

the only thing that’s changed is that half a mile away a big field has been ploughed up for weeks with heavy machinery in order to build yet another housing estate and the noise in the day coming from there is horrendous, from 8 am till 5pm.

no song birds, no jackdaws, no birds in my garden, not even a sparrow.

in all my 47 years I’ve never known a place to be devoid of birds and bird sounds.

Less birds here too, and noticeably less mini beasts. Our garden is normally buzzing from late spring. We have one or two bees and the very occasional butterfly. I guess less bugs means less food.

Sorry to hear that.

We've had loads. Am listening to them at the moment. The swallows have made a second nest in our shed so that's about 12 babies in all this year (if they all survive).

We are lucky with where we live though. Loads of coast and countryside. Local farm raises animals rather than crops.

It is the same here. No small birds at all. No wood pigeons this year. Just a couple of crows, an occasional magpie. Hardly any insects. The bird feeder untouched.
We used to get sparrows, finches, wrens, black birds, woodpeckers, thrushes - they disappeared years ago.
There are no squirrels at all now. Just an occasional fox. It is really worrying.

My corner of North East Wales (just outside Wrexham) has increasingly over the years become more and more urbanised and so much countryside has been lost to new housing estates and retail parks. Our local council have ripped out hedges between houses on council estates and replaced them with metal railings to improve the look. As a result no sparrows anymore. No one cares.

im so envious of people living in the countryside. I hate it here. Can’t afford to move and all my children are here

It is very worrying, we were the same, used to get a wide variety of birds, squabbling over the feeder and the noise in the morning was a delight to hear.

i can hear a wood pigeon and a couple of seagulls. That’s it. Not one songbird.

i heard them in spring and that was the last time.

I live in London but a lot of gardens and I used to love the dawn chorus.
Now the magpies have moved in and there's no birds singing any more. It's very sad and also they are very noisy!

The jackdaws are in my garden. 100s of them and their noisy kids. I’m lying in bed now and I can hear their cacophony. We also get parakeets who are similarly noisy, but they don’t show up until later in the day.

We are lucky in that we get a huge variety of birds. My husband feeds them and we have nesting and roosting boxes dotted around several of our trees, so it’s bird heaven.

There are really high sulphur dioxide concentrations in the air this morning from the volcano in Iceland. The birds are really sensitive to this sort of thing. Hope they’re ok.

This is the time of year when most birds are moulting. So they're quieter and hiding more due to their feathers falling out making them vulverable. Breeding season is pretty much over, so no dawn chorus. They're all kind of knackered and scruffy so keeping a low profile. It's a yearly thing you might just have never noticed it.

Oh really! I didn’t know that, that’s interesting about the volcano.

i love jackdaws. They don’t migrate, are home birds and don’t fly far from their roosts. I really miss not seeing them

Ah I didn’t realise this and it does make sense thank you

@KatParr I usually have loads of birds here, I feed and water them every day year round but every August, without fail, they all disappear. Even the jackdaws that nest in the church opposite vanish! The odd wood pigeon pops in for a drink but that’s it.

Last week, I asked a client who’s a keen birdwatcher why this was. He said the same as you — moulting time (my mum’s parrot is also mounting atm and quite frankly I wouldn’t be seen in public either looking like that 😂). Also there is abundant wild food in the hedgerows, and most of the birds have finished raising their last brood of the season so don’t need to be on the constant grocery shop!

Mine always come back in September so take heart OP, they may well return.

It's the same here. They all come back in the autumn though, looking for food. All we've got at the moment are magpies and wood pigeons that keep pooing in the birdbath.😯