We get wintering Blackcaps in our garden every year, and this spring there was a resident bird through the summer in our neighbourhood too.
Yesterday, 6 December, there was a male Blackcap on the fatballs in our garden. That’s great. But it is also the earliest winter record, ever, in our garden. The previous earliest record was 31 December several years ago.
I mention this partly because it is of passing interest but also because while I was talking to someone on the phone last week they stopped the conversation to tell me that there was a male Blackcap- in their garden – the first before Christmas ever.
Two anecdotes don’t make a trend but they start to… Any early wintering Blackcaps in your garden today?
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We had a male Blackcap feeding on Spindle berries, last week, in our Gloucestershire garden. I know of one other sighting about a mile away, also from a few days back.
There was, I think, a male Blackcap on one of our feeders this morning and possibly one, the same one I guess, last week as well. I did not know they were visitors until our local ornithological expert told me.
I didn’t note the date but it was at least a week ago I had my first male Blackcap in my central Bristol garden
My neighbour had one on his feeder last week, first time ever in December, generally turn up in January.
Despite lots of feeding opportunities natural and otherwise our mid Wales garden is devoid of them, as usual. however when I lived in Harrogate we had them most winters. they usually appeared in late December and disappeared in late March one winter we had at least three regulars. WE of course have lots of other bird species to keep us happy.
For the last four years I have recorded blackcaps at the beginning of November feeding on various berry laden shrubs in the garden.
Here on the West Cumbrian Coast we had a male , showing well, from 21st November with a female present on 26th – that being our only way of knowing that we have more than one. They feed every winter on the berries of Himalayan Honeysuckle but the male has taken to feeding voraciously on some windfall apples spiked onto branches.
In 2019 we had a female on 18th October so was she a late departing summer visitor or an early winter visitor?
I usually only get blackcaps in spring in my garden.But on 4th December i had my first wintering 2 blackcaps in my shrubs here in Lancashire
There was a very interesting session in the BTO conference last week showing that our wintering blackcaps come from a far wider area than just S. Germany/Austria as previously thought. Trackers have shown that birds breeding across France and even a few in NE Spain travel due North to winter in the UK! Also they come to us from further East and span a 2000 km range. The talk is the last of three sessions entitled ‘In the Garden and Wintering Blackcaps’ and is available on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbiVHzczkKM&list=PLFFgJk1PU_BPHIa4VbMw-6ulLc4lh6hPN&index=5
Nick – many thanks. I enjoyed that Blackcap talk very much.
Checking our Garden Birdwatch records we discovered that blackcaps have been recored in our E Midlands garden in every week of the year bar one over a seven year period. The main time for seeing them is when the berries on the big elder bush opposite the kitchen window ripen in late August and through September. We get almost daily visits by up to four birds (while stocks last as they say…). We also hang a big bunch of mistletoe opposite the same window in December and in one particular winter, a female blackcap appeared on 3rd January and stayed with us until late March. She commuted between the mistletoe and apples cut in half and wired to a bird table – but she never went near the fat balls, peanuts or seed feeders hanging nearby!
Nick – good observations, thanks.