Young Blackbird

#1 Sigma 70-20mm @170mm f4.5 1/90s

[IMG]http://i1236.photobucket.com/albums/ff444/Frogherder/IMGP7158.jpg[/IMG]

#2 Tamrom 500mm f5.6 1/15s
[IMG]http://i1236.photobucket.com/albums/ff444/Frogherder/IMGP7149.jpg[/IMG]

The drama of a slugs demise was acted out only feet from where I was sitting. Bird was completely calm in my presence and spent about 15 mins devouring his lunch, even allowing me to change lenses and reposition my tripod

Bernard

Bernard

Well captured, they are very friendly birds. I never knew that they
ate slugs (thrushes eat snails). I wonder if it's having trouble
finding worms?

Our local blackbirds haven't been seen since the heavy rain last
week

Number 2 is a bit yuck Nice feather detail from the Tamron though!

Thank you for the comments.

They eat slugs in my garden, even seen them robbing a frog of his catch.

I suppose if we ate slugs and had no fingers (or back of hand) then spinnach in the teeth would be the least of our faux pas.

He's (or his brother/sister, there are 3 of them) back again this morning uprooting my sweet william seedlings. I think the dry weather is making them search any damp (potting) compost for prey.


Bernard

I think that's a female

Now she's back (how can you tell?) pulling up my wall flower seedings.


Bernard

As I understand it the males are black from fairly early on. I know we had a male about the same size bouncing around last month, I got the impression he was being trained to take over the family seat from his dad (who would normally see off any other males)!

An amazingly tame species. He actually came bouncing over to see what was going on if you went into the garden! I just hope he's ok as I haven't seen our Blackbird family for a few weeks now.

Matt's right... the male is black and has a yellow beak from early on.
I had one last year that used to come onto a bush about 4 ft from me and he used to open his mouth as though he expected me to feed him

I've had male and females actually come onto the door threshold looking for raisins or mixed fruit. One had a damaged beak and was really tame I almost trod on him once. It's really funny watching them sunbathing or having a bath.

The female in my portfolio is one of two that are usually in my garden but AWOL for the past week.

Thanks guys for the updated information.

The older male is not as trusting as the younger ones and usually scurries into the undergrowth when we appear (guilty concience we reckon). Sat and watched him stuff himself with 27 rowen berries before he flew off, I can't imagine where they all fit.

Spent part of this morning trying to capture a snap of a bird I haven't seen before - looks like a cross twixt a starling (black chest with speckles) and a large sparrow (brown head, back and wings), but by the time I'd set up and focused it had gone (gave up after the 4th try and went back to pricking out seedlings - again)

Bernard