Dunnock delusions

The dunnocks have been very amenable. I am not sure which is which, but I am very fond of them. I think you've seen my attempts to film them courting. There is another better video in a few days, but let's go all out of sequence. I saw one of the dunnocks gathering nesting material. The little bird went in and out repeatedly with beak loads of wool. I only just managed to get some pictures!!

Talking of nests, now, I saw this wool business on 22nd March, I think. Two days earlier I saw a magpie go into the bushy trees below the tree to the south of the garden where Bobbit sings. The magpie went in without calling and came out fairly rapidly with something in his beak. Not an egg. Something that could have been a bird or a baby squirrel. Afterwards, and I may have been sort of making this up, I was sure I heard a bird making sad unanswered contact calls... do magpies do that? Let's see.... hold on... Yes. They'll eat young or small birds. Can kill sparrows, for example. And yes, they'll kill squirrels too.

I hope the dunnock... and the rest.. find secure places to nest.