The Siskins

This is the new feeding pole.  On it hang three Niger feeders, one sunflower seed feeder and one feeder containing sunflower hearts.

Below this is a tray that fulfills two functions.  It acts as a baffle to prevent squirrels from climbing up to the food, and it catches some of the Niger seeds that are dropped when the birds take seed from the feeders.  As this is probably more than is eaten by the birds on the feeders, the fact that some birds come to eat it from the tray and the ground is a bonus.

There are only 17 siskins and 3 goldfinches visible here.  Sometimes we get 8 or 10 on the tray rather than the 3 shown.

The third goldfinch is the one coming into land on the right towards the top of the picture.

There are so many siskins here that it is difficult to count them, even in a still picture like this.  Our estimate of 56 is taken from counting birds on a much larger image than this one.

As well as the birds here, the air is filled with twittering from more birds in the surrounding trees.  There must be well over 100 birds in the flock in total.