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Blackbird nest not in a good place - what do I do?
Pete.8
Posts: 11,340
Just outside my lounge I have a big star jasmine against a fence.
Every year blackbirds build a nest in the jasmine.
I watch as they build the nest but leave them in peace.
Every year by mid summer I notice the blackbirds have gone and when I look in the nest there are just the remains of the broken eggs - I 'm guessing squirrels have eaten them.
This has happened for about the last 5-6 years - every year eggs are destroyed.
Over the last couple of days I see a pair of blackbirds once again building a nest in the same spot.
What should I do leave them to it, or keep pulling out the nest they're building until the get the message?
I love to watch them, but am heartbroken that the eggs never get to hatch
Billericay - Essex
Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit.
Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.
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All part of nature, leave it alone.
In the sticks near Peterborough
Do you or your neighbours feed the birds/squirrels/rats? Nests near to bird feeders are known to have higher rates of predation as a result of squirrels and corvids attracted by the food? Link: https://www.reading.ac.uk/news-and-events/releases/PR707708.aspx
Yes - very much so.
My neighbour spends her life 'caring' for the birds. £15/week on seed throughout the year with over 20 feeders in her garden.
Needless to say rats abound
Billericay - Essex
Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit.
Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.
You can't do anything - as Nut says, it's part of nature.
Also, it's against the law to interfere with nesting birds.
Maybe create more options for nest sites in future years?
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
There are plenty of options all over the big gardens round here, and we're on the edge of arable farmland and woodland but every year they build a nest in the exact same spot just outside my lounge. I feel privileged, but always ends in sadness - that's nature I suppose
I guess I'll leave them to it and just keep my fingers x'ed
Billericay - Essex
Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit.
Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.
Somewhere there's a mammal feeding its family .... just the way of things.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
I did eat a chicken myself the other day
Billericay - Essex
Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit.
Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.
There you go, so did we ................ part of life's rich pattern .................. we can be soooooooooooo sentimental sometimes
Last edited: 24 March 2017 09:36:37
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
I'll stop fretting and get on with making my new heated seedling protector instead then
Thanks to all!
Billericay - Essex
Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit.
Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.
Leave them alone. Blackbireds will have multiple broods in a season. If a nest fails due to predation they will choose a new nest site, hopefulily one in a safer location. It is very unlikely that it is the same pair year on year. Blackbirds don't live all that long.