Birdwatching and creativity
The RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch is fast-approaching (24th - 26th January 2025) and I thought I’d take this moment to share with you why I love taking part in this citizen science project to observe and record the birds that visit my garden, what I do to prepare and how the activity inspires my art.
The RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch
In case you’ve never come across the RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch, it is the world's largest garden wildlife survey (more than 600,000 people in the UK took part in 2024, recording 9.7 million birds). The information helps the RSPB to build a picture of how garden birds are faring in our changing climate and to lobby government to take action to support biodiversity.
Taking part is very simple - you just need to choose a 1hour window between 24th and 26th January and count and record the birds that visit your garden. You only record the birds that land in your patch (not those flying over) and you need to record the highest number of each bird species that you see at any one time (eg, if you count x3 sparrows in the first fifteen minutes, then later in the time period x6 sparrows land - you record '6 sparrows' (not 9!). Even if you spend an hour watching and don't see any birds, it is important to submit your record of this to help monitor the decline in bird populations - the results from the Big Garden Birdwatch show that we've lost 38 million birds in the last 60 years.
Getting my garden ready
This week I’ve been cleaning my bird feeders and filling them with a variety of different RSPB-approved bird food (beware cheap bird feed found in supermarkets as it might not have the best ingredients - much like human food - and could actually make your visitors ill!)
There’s a bit of an art and science to placing your feeders.
I try to space them around different spots in the garden that are not too close to bushes (that might hide lurking predators, like cats), but close enough to cover so that the birds can easily dart to and from if they catch wind of our local sparrowhawk!
Out of the wind is also ideal, but that's a harder requirement to satisfy when you live on the North East coastline!
I try to have a mix of seed, fat balls and suet nibbles as well as leftover scraps from the kitchen (stale bread and cake, bits of cheese, dried fruits, apple cores, etc) and some mealworms for the robins and blue tits.
I also fill the garden birdbath that we inherited with the house, to ensure that the birds have some clean water to drink (although we also have a small pond that they love the splash in).
Watching birds
Observing the birds visiting my garden always brings me joy, whether that is as part of the Big Garden Birdwatch, or at any other time of the year. Watching gangs of sparrows fighting over access to the feeder in Spring is always fun - as is spotting a new or less-often sighted visitor, such as bullfinch or chaffinch, which we don’t often see in our garden here.
As a wildlife artist, having this simple way to attract birds into my space so that I can study and sketch them is so important to my being able to create realistic illustrations of birdlife, that capture their nature and characteristics, as well as their shape, form and colour.
Some gestural sketches of robins in my sketchbook
If you’re taking part in this year’s Big Garden Birdwatch - or even if you’re not - why not have a go at turning your observations into inspiration for a creative project. You could:
sketch or paint the birds visiting your garden. If sketching a bird in full feels like too big an ask, why not create colour swatches of the birds' plumage as a little visual reminder of your visitors?
use a camera or just your phone to capture the birds in motion and experiment with some of the filters and modes on your camera to get a bit more creative with your pictures
write about the birds' behaviour when they're feeding. Do they like to watch the feeder before landing? Do they feed quickly, or spend longer sitting on the feeder, whilst regularly checking their surroundings? Get more creative and name your bird visitors and write up little 'personality' reports.
My British Songbirds collection
After being inspired by the 2024 Big Garden Birdwatch and an instagram challenge to draw a songbird each day in February, I created a set of 16 illustrations of some of Britain’s native songbirds, including: Blackbird, Blue tit, Coal tit, Dipper, Goldfinch, Grasshopper warbler, House martin, House sparrow, Kingfisher, Magpie, Meadow pipit, Nuthatch, Robin, Rook, Song thrush and Wren. The collection features:
An A4 Art Print with all 16 songbird illustrations, including the birds’ habitat and conservation status.
A 100% unbleached organic cotton tea towel, featuring the same design
x10 note cards (blank inside) with a different bird on each card, made from recycled card and complete with a kraft paper envelope
x10 coaster designs with a different bird on each, made from sustainably-sourced wood and with a cork base.
Where to buy
This collection is available to buy from my Folksy shop, my website and also look out for it with local stockists, like Puddles (West Street, Berwick-upon-Tweed).