I have been slightly inactive for the past week mainly due to Wimbledon and Glastonbury however when schedules allowed I have been in the garden enjoying some very close encounters courtesy of the destructive behavior of a young Great Spotted Woodpecker.
It all started when I caught this young pecker systematically taking every grub out of the bee box which had been diligently laid and sealed up over the past month by either mining bees or leaf cutter bees (I'm not sure which). Every chamber had been used but in the space of minutes each one had been broken into and the grub taken so in an attempt to divert the bird away from the box and give the bees a second chance I filled up all the peanut feeders. The feeders are only about six foot away from my garden bench and have been quickly found by a family of nine Great Tits and the young Wood Pecker. They don't seem to mind me sitting so close and I have had the most marvellous views with the young Great Tits even joining me on the bench. A near disaster though this evening when one of the young Great Tits flew into the patio window, we picked it up stunned and it took it a good ten minutes to come round and fly off.
You can see just one chamber complete but a bee is back sealing up second from the right top row!
