Bluetit Diary    Jan 2005 (4)

 

 

Tuesday 11th January, 2005

I don't know quite how to say this, but there seems to be a problem with Box2!

In the middle of the morning, I started up i-Catcher as we do from time to time in the hope of collecting some interesting pictures. While Box1 looked quite normal, this was the view of box  2 that we were presented with.

My first reaction was that the blustery winds of the last night had disturbed the positioning of the camera mounted on the garage roof, so I went to investigate.

What I discovered was that it was not the camera that had been blown out of position in the night, but the tree itself!

Those of you who have been following this diary for some time will remember that this time last year, the silver birch tree on which Box2 was then mounted blew down.  Fortunately, it was blown against the adjacent oak tree which prevented it falling much out of the vertical position so that the box, camera and cabling were all undamaged.  I could therefore remove all this equipment before the tree, whose trunk had snapped near the ground, was removed.  If you are interested in seeing a picture of the rotten stump and reading what happened then, click here.

This year looks like a repeat of that story.  After the old tree had been removed, we remounted Box2 on an adjacent silver birch about 10 feet further up the boundary.  Again this tree is growing just inside my next door neighbour's garden.  This time the wind has given it a list of about 5 or 10 degrees across the passage along the back of our house towards our garage.  Our fear is that another gale will bring it crashing down on the garage roof!

 

 

Thursday 20th January, 2005

After my last post, I went and fetched the ladder to remove Box2 from the listing silver birch tree.

I understand from our neighbour that the tree will come down shortly, so now we have to find yet another home for this box and one that is near enough to its old position to continue to attract the birds that have shown an interest in it.

is what the external camera now sees - a hole where the box used to be. 

We have been trying to think where to re-mount the bird box.  We want a VERY STRONG TREE which will not be jinxed into blowing down next winter.  There is only one nearby that comes close to filling this requirement, and that is the oak tree that I have already mentioned.

Unfortunately, that will require a fair amount of trimming back to create an open space for the box.  In addition, it will no longer be visible from the external camera mounted on the garage and I can see no way of mounting it so that we get such good shots of the comings and goings of the bluetits to that box.

A minor point, but I will also have to extend the cable to reach the oak tree.  The current cable snakes its way round the outside of the house and I do not want to have to replace it, so I will have to find out how to extend it in a way that is weatherproof.