The Birds

As you may know by now, the garden that came with our new house isn't really a garden in the true sense, it's more a patch of yellow sand and clay with some tiles dropped in. We've tried very hard to change that, and some nice plants are starting to grow, but it will be at least a couple of months before it can really truly be called a garden (I will add pictures!). And even then, it will be one of very very few in the neighbourhood, as most people just pave the whole thing over and throw in some expensive 'lounge' furniture and an oversized barbecue.
Which is why I am so very happy that one little sparrow has found its way into our garden and is hopping around the (small, just coming in to leaf) birch tree. We left the bird feeder up because it was still quite cold, and the sparrow has been spreading seed husks all over the surrounding area, in a great show of appetite. Our first bird! Apart from the colony of jackdaws living next door, of course, but they don't really visit the garden, they just hop around on the shed and in the raingutters.
But there has been some activity in our birdhouse as well: small twigs are now sticking out of the creaks in the bottom. We're not sure whether it is the same sparrow (they tend to nest in groups) or whether a lonely blue tit or great tit has found it, but we're keeping our fingers crossed that we may even get a bird-in-residence.
And then yesterday we were sitting outside in front of our house, because that's where the sun is in the late afternoon, and we heard this frantic chirping by little chicks, and discovered that there are several nestboxes under the raingutters of the houses on the opposite side of the street. They're of the type more commonly known as 'sparrow flats', with several openings for sparrows to nest together. One family had clearly already hatched, and both parents were flying in and out bringing food.
All of this made me very happy.
One of the first things I learnt when I started my biology studies was that most biologists study birds because they're a) not nocturnal and b) one of the last patches of nature that can actually withstand the pressure of the city. This area is not extremely bad, naturewise, there are lots of trees and bushes next to the railroad tracks, and if you cross the ring road you're in the middle of the fields (with complementary manure wafts if the wind turns that way), but it's no bird heaven, especially with all the cats and dogs and small children running around. But, as ever, nature finds its way, even if it is with the help of some man-made nest boxes.
And then to top it all off: yesterday evening we had a bat in the garden, gracefully swooping around to clear out the mosquitoes.