A little bird called a dunnock has been obsessively flying from the wall at the boundary of our garden, up to the frame of the sitting room window, where it sings urgently, flaps its wings hard and taps its beak against the glass. It stays in this position for maybe ten seconds at a time, then flies back to the wall. Another dunnock sits nearby, and flies about too but doesn't display the same puzzling behaviour. We think the other is the female. We think the male is staking out his territory, and seeing his reflection in the window, comes over to see off the rival male he believes is challenging him. L put sheets of card up at the window for a few days to reduce the reflection, and it seemed to work, then we had guests for the weekend and took them down. But while I was talking to my mother on the phone this morning, little dunnock was back to his fluttering, singing and tapping.
We had a good afternoon digging over more ground at the allotment in gorgeous sunshine. I found a small plaster mole, who has officially become the mascot of our plot. Unfortunately I had to stop my digging after an hour or so as I'm suffering from vertigo again, and all that bending and leaning forward to pick up weeds was making it worse.
I am still waiting to hear something about the job I've applied for, but as the closing date was Friday and the interviews next Thursday, I am rapidly losing hope. Time for a rethink.
1 comment:
There are several bird species here that attack their reflections in glass, and yes, it's territorial behavior on the male's part, unable to recognize the reflection as himself. Where I live, we've found cardinals to be the most persistent, sometimes returning to the same window on subsequent years. Cardboard on the outside of the pane is the only real solution.
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