We have a wren....

[reetnproper]

.... back in the garden and what a wonderful sight (not to mention sound) it is too.

We've had wrens every year for the last four years and have spent ages watching them hopping from one pot or tub to another, ferreting around the veg garden, eating all those horrible aphids and caterpillars but we hadn't seen any for such a long time that we feared that the neighbourhood cats had got them.

All day I'd been hearing this amazingly loud but chirpy sound in the garden but I couldn't pin it down. Then I spotted him (I think it's a him) hopping in and out of the bean tubs, working his way down the line and up and down the foliage, presumably feasting on the aphids .

Later, down by the greenhouses I heard the chirping again and spotted the wren sitting on the top of the fence, just 3 foot from me, happily calling away. I think he's nesting/roosting in the laurels but I'm not sure why he's calling so much. I thought males (if that's what he is) called to attract females to his nest but that was during spring. Or could it be a female calling to her fledglings?

Whatever the reason, it's a pure joy to have such a beautiful bird and such a friend to the gardener back in the garden .

Reet
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[ginger ninger]

There very territorial, he's letting other male wren's in the area know that your garden is his and to keep out...or else.
But I have to agree with you Reet...they sound wonderful although noisy. I have a pair visits the garden they scurry around in mi red current bush and runner bean arch for the caterpillar's and bugs most days. I really hope Jinny doesn't try to make a meal out of any of them. If there in the garden when he want's to go out I keep him in until they scurry away.

[Queen of Spades]

We have wrens on our allotment too, but didn't know where they were nesting till I came to put some bits in one of the home made compost bins. It's a plastic barrel with 1" holes drilled in rows all around it, big enough for wrens, small enough to keep bigger birds and cats out.

[reetnproper]

It's a parent bird with fledglings in our garden . I was priviledged enough to see a parent bird feeding a baby this morning and managed to snap a couple of pic's of the baby. I've attached one of it waiting for mum/dad to come back with more food.

The garden is alive with the sound of adult calls and baby responses .

Reet
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[Queen of Spades]

That's beautiful, Reet. And what a lovely picture. Was hoping to get a chance to take some similar, but lots of cats around at the moment, there are more alarm calls than singing, and I'm afraid fledgelings have gone. We keep finding piles of feathers from our neighbour's homing pigeons on our lawn, and a sparrow hawk's getting a few too. Nature eh!

[Jeanied]

How lovely Reet. I love to hear the wren singing away at my allotment. I like the way it flutters its wings in time with the warbly bits in its song.