We seem to have alot of Sparrowhawks this season, we have seen atleast 3 around, and seen one actually take a small bird from the bird feeding stand we have.
Are they breeding better, or is there more around?
I've been her 12 years and only ever seen 1 around.

We also alot of Buzzards around, which I adore to see.

They are breeding better, and don't have many predators or competition to control them, so in built up areas particularly, where you get a lot of people feeding garden birds, they will thrive, as there are no larger raptors or other birds competing for the same food supply around, but plenty of well fed meals for them. 

Try and make sure you put your bird feeders where it will be difficult for them to swoop straight in and make a kill, and also where smaller birds can get to thicker cover away from predators. 

wow kenya, lucky you....we put nuts out for "garden birds" to try and attract them in (the spars that is!)but only have one or two regular spar visitors, wish we had more. have a nice group of common buzzards on the farm and a pere in the quarry qhich is nice though :)

We get sparrowhawks regularly in our garden, hunting and sitting (and they sit long enough for me to find a camera too!).   During the winter the buzzards that hunt across the field use our ash tree as a lookout post too - one in particular liked to eye up our puppy when he was small!

It's quite likely that people who started to feed birds during the severe weather have continued to do so and the sparrowhawks have simply followed the food chain.  They do thrive where the food is so if you feed your garden birds regularly you may well attract their attention, particularly if they can enter and exit quite easily.  If you feed very close to your house you might reduce the risk but they are very adept at manouvering as you would expect.

I love to see them and I certainly don't mind the predatory behaviour - in fact I save more small birds by feeding them than a sparrowhawk would take.

Generally though I do think raptors of all kinds seem to be doing well.  Red Kites have extended their range from the Chilterns down to us in North Somerset over the last year or two and I had several sightings of a Marsh Harrier earlier in the year too.

Oh this thread makes me sad.

I've had to stop feeding the birds because of rats!! Does anyone have a miracle solution for this? I have tried scatter free seed but still a mess attracts those damn rats. The trouble here is we have no ground feeding birds so any mess stays there.

Tonight, last years woodpecker flew to my bird table and made a show of looking in all corners for his seed!! Broke my heart!

>I've had to stop feeding the birds because of rats!! Does anyone have a miracle solution for this? I have tried scatter free seed but still a mess attracts those damn rats. The trouble here is we have no ground feeding birds so any mess stays there.

I'm very glad to say we don't have rats but we do have ground feeding birds like collared doves and the odd wood pigeon.  Currently we've got visiting ducks and a few weeks ago we had regular moorhen visitors.  I have to say our terrier type mongrel probably helps keep rats away but I suspect it's more to do with the nearby farms that have better rat food!!

Have you thought about trapping the rats?  Apparently it's doable but you have to despatch them humanely afterward - not sure I'd know quite how to do that...

I read in this rat control article that rats are neophobic which means they are wary of new objects - perhaps you could just rotate some odd objects under your feeders  (like a cat!!).  Just a thought, your woodpecker will eat peanuts and they don't leave quite so much mess.  Another option is to create a hard surface area under the feeders and sweep up each day, I hang one of my seed feeders over a stone bath which helps to stop the doves from making my grass bald.

Do you know, this is what surprises me. I live on a shooting estate and you would think the rats would stay firmly around the pheasant feeders. But ohhhh no...they set up residence in my garden! Still makes me shudder when I opened the patio doors and a rat ran past just inches from my feet!!

I am ashamed to admit that I got a pest control company in to deal with the rats. The final straw came when I found an area to the side of the house where they seemed to be attempting to dig their way into the house!!

I did attach a peanut feeder to a telegraph pole about 200 yards from the house. However, last week, the gamekeeper asked me to remove it as they were having problems with rats at the farmhouse and were baiting them. He feared that the blighters would just shift nest and take up towards my feeders!

Rats are VERY neophobic. They are such intelligent wee creatures. Oddly, I fear not for myself but for the diseases they carry which may effect my dogs!!

> I fear not for myself but for the diseases they carry which may effect my dogs!!

Unfortunately the diseasses they carry equally can affect you, weils and Lepto are zoonotic.

I know Brainless. Ironically I don't seem to worry about my own health! The dogs are another matter all together!!

We live on a farm, but dont ever see rats about, we have cats and there alot of cats around the farm area, which must keep them down.
I tried to take a picture of a Sparrowhawk today sitting on the fence watching the birds feeding, unfortunatley I'm too slow and the bird had gone! :-(

Got to tell you Fiona Birds Of Prey as much as I think they are beautiful to watch and look at having just had our 11th racing pigeon this season come home from training with BOP injuries doesn't make me very happy.  I know people say "thats nature" etc but when a sport is dying out due to the protected status which has led to over population of BOP I find it hard to stand in awe of there aerobatic skills anymore.  And the 11 is only the ones that made it home injured we are down 18 pigeons who either ended up as chick food or just got lost.  We are in the centre of town and have had BOP sit on the steps in front of our pigeon loft and make a meal of our pigeons. 

Last year alone our loft alone lost aprox 40 pigeons over the racing season.  :-(

thats nature :)

> ear not for myself but for the diseases they carry which may effect my dogs!!

Anecdotally;
During my childhood (in Cumbria) my Father ( a Falconer/Austringer) was Inspector of the Environment for The British Falconry Society. We would more often than not have one or more of the birds on a perch in the kitchen. The perches were one side of the Aga and my dad's gun dogs were the other side all co-habited with ner' a problem.
   I do remember always being acutely embarrassed when I brought friends home though! there would always be a brace of something or other hanging in the porch and my dad still to this day tells the story of my first boyfriend fainting when, whilst rumaging in the freezer I asked him what he fancied for dinner, not thinking anything of the fact I had a solid frozen crow in one hand and bag of frozen dale chicks in the other!... Dad had a habit of just chucking his game and the birds dinners on top of ours :-D
   Now I look back and realise I had quite a fun childhood! (though maybe not if I was a vegetarian ;-))