Trevor's Kitchen Garden How I grow my own food and how you can too.

Female sparrowhawk (accipiter nisus) taking a break from hunting to do some manwatching.

After clearing weeds, it is not unusual for a robin, a blackbird, song thrush or some starlings or sparrows to arrive for a feed when they see upturned soil. Bird food in the form of insects and worms attracts garden birds as readily as the peanut or sunflower seed feeders hanging from the birdtable. However the other day a very unusual visitor caused a panic among the small birds when it landed on one of the rowan trees in the front garden.

A very imposing and self-confident sparrowhawk was in no hurry to move on from my small 20 by 30 foot front garden. I had time to get my camera, go to an upstairs window and take a few snaps of this imposing bird of prey below in the rowan tree outside. It seemed the sparrowhawk was studying me as much as I was observing her. Meanwhile, all the sparrows and other small birds made themselves scarce. Only when a neighbour’s car pulled in to the driveway next door did this acrobat of the air blithely take off. With all the young fledgling garden birds starting to leave their nests, this is probably the easiest time of year to get a meal if you are a sparrowhawk, so plenty of time for this beautiful bird of prey to hang out a do a bit of manwatching.