Nature Happenings #9

A charming encounter

Hello and welcome to another Nature Happenings from me, Emma.

As Andrew mentioned above, we’ve been trying to create lots of space for wildlife in our garden and last year, we cleared the turf from a long stretch beside the garden wall and sowed a ‘tall’ native wildflower mix. Last year, we only had leaves as most of the plants are perennial or bi-annual, meaning they flower in their second year, so this year we have been excitedly watching as the plants grew taller, produced buds and finally in the last few weeks, began flowering.

One of these plants, common sorrel, has been particularly successful and is now starting to go to seed. Recently we’ve noticed a very ‘charming’ group of friends has taken a liking to the seeds that have now formed where the flowers were. Goldfinches!

Known collectively as a ‘charm’, goldfinches have a distinctive tinkling call that can be heard as they pass overhead and with their bright red heads and yellow wing patch, are easy to identify. Growing up in 1980s Manchester close to the city centre, there was little in the way of local green space and therefore, wildlife. BUT along the back of our house was a large, rather overgrown patch of thistles. Goldfinches love to eat the seeds (their beak is long and thin, perfectly adapted for accessing them) and I will always remember being transfixed as an 8 year old watching these magical, brightly coloured, exotic looking birds that would come in large groups to feed on the thistle seeds. My Dad and I soon became bird enthusiasts and I was given binoculars and a membership to the Young Ornithologists Club. We’d visit local RSPB reserves together and holidays to North Wales and Scotland became opportunities to spot new birds (Dad often slamming the brakes on if he spotted a kestrel or buzzard as we were driving through countryside).

When I shared this video with my Dad earlier this week, he replied with ‘my gateway bird’ which is exactly how I’d described them to Andrew earlier in the day as he was filming it. I can certainly trace my love of wild things back to these beautiful garden birds who will always delight me whenever I spot them.

So, if you’d like to encourage goldfinches to your own garden, maybe plant some sorrel, or thistles and don’t forget to let the dandelions grow and go to seed as these too are a favourite food.

Do you have a ‘gateway bird’ or creature, or plant? Do share in the comments, we’d love to hear what first sparked your love of Nature!