Flaxton Environment Group Birdwatch 2025

Big Garden Birdwatch

It’s that time of year again!  Big Garden Birdwatch weekend is rapidly approaching.  You may have heard about it in the media or indeed taken part before.  It is the largest garden wildlife survey in the world and is run each year in January by the RSPB. Last year a number of people who recorded birds in Flaxton sent their results to the Environment Group and we produced a report which is available on the Parish Council website (here: Big-Garden-Birdwatch-report-Flaxton.pdf).

We are planning to do this again in 2025 so if you are planning to take part we would be very grateful if you would let us see your results as well as posting them online to the RSPB. Please include details of where you live, what species you’ve seen and the maximum number of each species seen at any one time, and send by email to . We will put together the results we receive into a short report for Flaxton, which will summarise what was seen but will retain anonymity for those who contributed – we won’t mention any names or addresses of those who took part.  This will be available on the Parish Council website and will be copied to all those who contributed.  Full details on how to take part can be found at Big Garden Birdwatch

Little brown jobs (“LBJ’s”)

LBJ is a birding term for those little brown birds that all look similar and are hard to tell apart! Last year some people recorded ‘sparrows’, but there are actually two species of sparrow in Flaxton, house sparrows and tree sparrows, and it would be really helpful if you can say which you saw – you might even see both!  To add to the confusion you are quite likely also to see dunnocks, (sometimes called hedge sparrows but not really sparrows) which are superficially similar but are quite easy to tell apart once you get to know them.  If you’re not sure of the differences have a look at the identification guide below.  It also includes reed bunting but you aren’t very likely to see these in the garden so don’t worry too much about them.

Free bird feeders

This year we have some spare bird feeders to give away to participants.  There are two seed feeders, a fat ball feeder and a peanut feeder, all new, kindly donated by Sheelagh Massey. There are also some second hand feeders for sunflower or mixed seeds, peanuts, fat balls and niger seeds.  Maybe there are some families out there with children who would like to start feeding birds?  If you are interested in any of these, please contact Nigel Boatman by text or WhatsApp on 07805 446983 or by email: