More Nesting Box #2 Visiting

The Great Tit pair visited the nesting box a couple of times again yesterday morning..



...but so far no sign has been given as to them deciding to move in this season...


In the meantime a Sparrow entered box #1 and fixed around a bit. This morning at around 7:30 a solitary Sparrow perched on the wooden fence, waited around a bit, fluffed its feathers up, waited some more and then flew off.

Great Tit Pair Examining Nesting Box #2

Yesterday a pair of Great Tits examined nesting box #2 extensively...

(video snapshot)



This morning when I looked outside, I noticed one Great Tit flying out of the box. I sat down and waited. A pair of Great Tits came back and while one was waiting on the fence the other entered again.

In the meantime in nesting box #1, a Sparrow has already paid some visits this morning...

Eurasian Tree Sparrow Visits Again!

Alas, the sparrow has come back to visit. I am really happy.
I had already noticed one lingering in the tree early this morning, chirping happily.



you can hardly tell it is in there, but it is!!! If you don't believe me....there a somewhat out of focus snapshot of the bird entering...



..and here another...

Post-Easter Status

During Easter not much happened. The Eurasian Tree Sparrow visited nesting box #1 only once prior to Easter and never during the long weekend. I had already noticed that they hardly ever went to the box during weekends, so it might just be that the intense activity inside the house during Easter stopped the birds from lingering too long in the vicinity of the nest. I however fear that the nesting box has been abandoned for some reason.

The second nesting box was also more or less ignored until yesterday when a pair of Great Tits examined it on the outside a couple of times. This morning more examining was done and indeed the motion detection software recorded a few snapshots of Great Tits inside nesting box #2 between 7:30 and 8:15.





Whilst having breakfast, I noticed four Great Tits perched on the Tree in close vicinity of each other. Suddenly a fight broke out. It was not a serious fight, but one pair was clearly chasing the other. Nesting box #2 is clearly interesting. Some 30 minutes later a pair of Great Tits was perched on the wooden fence close to box #2. One waited whilst the other flew in.

I thus decided to send the signal coming from nesting box #1 to the video server to detect any motion in case the Eurasian Tree Sparrows come back and to record the signal coming from nesting box #2 in case the Great Tits decide to build a nest in it.

I am eager to go home and see what has happened....

Eurasian Tree Sparrow - "Double Chirp"

Whilst cutting a video from the live stream of the 25th of March, I noticed two other types of chirping of the Sparrow. I thus once again examined the frequencies using audacity. The results, I find, are quite interesting.

The plots below depict the frequencies for what I call the "double chirp" and the "single low tone chirp". The video below will help you understand what I mean. At the beginning while the Sparrow is in the nest you can hear the single low tone chirp and afterwards while it is perched in the hole, you can heat three double chirps.



These single and double chirps can also be seen in the image below.



The plot below depicts the difference the frequencies of a double chirp (green line) and a single low tone chirp (blue line).




The plot below depicts the difference the frequencies of a double chirp (blue line) and the cumulative frequencies of the video above.



The plot below depicts the frequencies obtained by examining a single double chirp (blue line) and three double chirps (green line).


Finally, the plot below depicts the difference between the frequencies obtained from three double chirps (red line), the single low tone chirp (blue line) and the frequencies obtained from other chirps in the past (17.03 and 12.03).

The Usual Suspects Visiting Nesting Box #2

After a second Kamin day (the technicians never finished installing the stove on the first Kamin day, and despite a second day will have to come back again) during which there was much human movement in the garden, the bird did not come to visit for two days.

Now things seem to have gone back to normal, the Eurasian Tree Sparrow went back to its nest in the first box and birds paid the second box a number of visits. This morning the list of usual suspects has gone up from 1 (Blue Tit) to 3 bird species...

Here below snapshots recorded by the video server.

At 8:14:15 (at 1 second intervals):




At 8:15:19 (at 1 second intervals):

Interesting Fact of the Week #1

The fluttering of the Tree Sparrow gave rise to a traditional Japanese dance, the Suzume Odori, which was depicted by artists such as Hokusai.


(Ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Suzume_Odori.jpg)

(In order not to loose old "interesting fact of the week" postings, I have decided to post them, which I am aware is not an elegant solution. The advantage:...when you see such a post, you know that I have gotten around making the weeks pass in my blog...which so far has not really followed any calender known to man!...i.e. a new interesting fact is posted under the assigned section)