Sticks, stones and no broken bones

Massive punch up at the window feeder between half a dozen starlings who have not yet evolved the idea of queues! Mealworms seem very popular. The poor sparrows are having to flit in when nobody's looking to pinch the leftovers! 

Yesterday our juvenile robin was perching within a foot of me as I was potting up a large stick, putting his head on one side and hopping about. I dont know if he understood what I was chatting to him about, but I think we were both content with the arrangement.

Potting up a stick, you ask? Are you mad? Quite possibly, but that's another story. The stick is a two inch thick piece of what I think is an Indian Bean Tree next door that fell off in the storms about a year ago. It was a nice straight branch, so we cut off the ends and put it in the shed and forgot it. Yesterday I noticed it was shooting from several nodes so I thought, what the hell, let's plant it and see what it does. 

The waterfall behind the wildlife pond

The pump that feeds the waterfall stopped working when I filled up the stand-alone reservoir. I had to take some of the waterfall apart and access the pump under the pebbles to give it a knock to start it going again. Very high tech here, we are. When I lifted up the stone covering the outlet pipe, there was a half grown frog sat there happily. He didn't want to move so before I put the stone back I had to give him a gentle push with my finger before he would hop away.