Learning curve…..

A trip to the beautiful county of Devon, and to several amazing gardens full of wildlife, has once again made me think about the differences between our gardens depending on location.  The wonderful garden at Coleton Fishacre on the south Devon coast had peregrines, common lizards and grass snakes.  Rosemoor, the  RHSGarden near Bideford was awash with birds – blackcaps, robins, bullfinches and chiff chaffs, while the bird feeders there were buzzing with tits, finches and sparrows.  The garden where I spent most of my week however, had woodland birds galore in the tall oaks all around and it was good to see treecreepers, nuthatches and marsh tits, plus plenty of song thrushes on the lawns.  Most intriguing though were a pair of chaffinches which came daily to sit on the door handles and stare in at us!  Both also tapped on the glass!  I’m sure other holiday makers were less generous than we were with crumbs and other titbits, but this learnt behaviour certainly paid off in terms of extra food!