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Angry Birds

Beapig

Mama Doe
My general experience of wild birds in the garden is that they co-exist in harmony with my rabbits: the sparrows flutter around Plumpkin as if she is Snow White and a little robin likes to have breakfast with Ham and Bea.

This afternoon a bitter magpie shattered the illusion - I spotted him pecking at Beatrice in the run and chasing her when she ran away. Hamilton tried to defend her and then the Magpie turned on him - we had to run out there to break it up!

What are your experiences of wild birds and bunnies?
 
When I did have outdoor rabbits there was no way for a bird to be able to get in to their run to bother them, we built our own aviary style run which had weldmesh under the flooring, mesh roof.

How are the birds able to get to your bunnies?
 
Birds can't get to my rabbits either as there is a mesh roof.

Magpies will probably have young in their nests atm and so will be braver than normal. They are unfortunately going around the garden here raiding other birds' nests and taking the baby birds for food. Being a Corvid they will be super intelligent and will have a purpose for attacking Beatrice, possibly hoping for some fur to line their nests maybe. They will also not forget, so make sure that if you are not there, they cannot access the rabbits.
 
Zoobec, they have a covered aviary type setup in the form of a repurposed greenhouse frame with weldmesh and acrylic roof (8x10ft) but that expands into a larger run which is uncovered, and they have access to that whenever we're around, which is most of the time as I work from home and can see them from my studio window.

Omi, that's scary stuff. I've never had a problem with any of the birds in our garden before, but will keep an eye out since this incident.

The bunnies weren't scared, just irritated by the bothersome magpie, but obviously the last thing I want is for them to get hurt so I'll be on my guard.
 
I know I shouldn't but I hate bloody Magpies!There's a nesting pair in a sycamore tree on council plot ocf land.At this time of year they are extra aggressive because they are nesting.I have bird feeders and my garden is full of fledged sparrows,starlings etc.So far,this year I've not witnessed them snatching young birds,but they have previous years.Poor wee things screeching in terror,they don't even have a quick kill like a hawk.I encourage a pair of carrion crows,the only birds the magpies fear! Yes I know crows are predators too,but Magpie numbers seemed to have exploded.I've seen magpies pulling on squirrels tails and cats ,bunnies would be fair game fir them .
 
I am in agreement with Kattymieoww. We have roosting magpies near us and a 'resident' little swine who disrupts life in our garden. He's chased other birds away from food we put out for them and just the other week I caught the little blighter chasing little Henry. I was not impressed and whilst I rarely wish ill on animals, in this case I am becomming intollerant of the magpie situation and I'd gleefully wring its neck if I could. There's a lot of magpies resident here and they seem to be overtaking crows. And they make a distinctive noise.
Our garden supports other birds which are far more appealing. We've got some lovely robins, a few wrens, some very friendly blackbirds and sparrows - which are nice to see because they are in decline. I've seen chaffinches and a woodpecker some months back. We try to encourage as much as possible, birds into the garden with treats and bird food. My two bunnies - 'Hillian' live in harmony with the other wildlife - with the exception of the magpie of course.
Interestingly, I observed what I regarded as rabbit translation, with my bridge bun Ben. I observed his 'tuning in' to birdsong one afternoon whilst outside in the garden. All was calm, relative sweet birdsong and rabbits merrily sunbathing. Then Ben's language changed. The birdsong had become more sharp and Ben went on full alert. On investigation, I discovered a cat sneaking and creeping round my garden, looking as though it was stalking my other bridge bun Georgina. Whilst an obvious observation is one of 'natural instinct' with regards to rabbits hearing an alarm call from a bird, to me it was clear indication that rabbits have a greater understanding of other animals communications. A fascinating thought in my opinion.
 
Kattymieoww, I know what you mean completely - even if it's nature, it is upsetting seeing this happen in the wild, especially to baby animals. I was honestly shocked by the aggression of the magpie towards the rabbits, even though they were bigger than him. Also proud of my bunnies for not fighting back (this might sound stupid, especially if it's in self defence, but my bunnies are just so good natured and often befriend birds, including magpies in the past, so they were probably quite puzzled by the situation).

Really interesting observation Craig! I do think that animals are more in tune with each other than we realise.

On that note I've got to give the magpies some credit, because a few days ago the magpies, crows and other birds alerted us to the garden with their screeches - it turned out our cat had stalked a pigeon. Thankfully the pigeon was fine and flew away after it had calmed down, but it was amazing that the birds were circling and even swooping at our cat to try and defend a different species of bird. I was really impressed by their teamwork!
 
I swear they are the bullies of the bird world.They zoom down and pull the tail feathers out of the big placid wood pigeons.Now I have a soft spot for wood pigeons.Their form of "aggression" is to nod heads at each other and wing flap each other.I have a "pet" one,last year something must have wrapped round its foot and it lost half it's back toe and its middle toe.So it's a bit hop along,it Will feed from my hand,loves peanuts,even ones that are fully shelled.It sits ,rather ungainly,on a clematis plant that grows by my back door.If I see that fruckin magpie anywhere near it and leap out the back door and scare the ****** off!;)
 
I heard a commotion in my back garden a couple of weeks ago, wasn’t sure what was going on at first but it turns out 2 magpies attacked and killed 2 smaller birds - one was still barely alive, but the magpies came back for it and also came back to get the other dead bird they’d left on my path. That put paid to my idea of free range garden time for my bunnies when I’m out in the garden, I would be worried they’d attack too quickly for me to prevent injury.
 
I was cuddling Willow in the garden a few months ago, she was toothpurring and enjoying it. Suddenly there was an alarm call from a bird, when previously they'd just been chirping. Immediately she was desperate to get out of my arms and under cover. I nearly dropped her as she was so desperate to get away. I managed to lower her to the ground and she ran into the shed at top speed
Cats on the other hand, she hasn't fear of. When I went to get her her Dad was curled up with the cat in the garden, so she's obviously picked up on that. You occasionally see a cat trying to stalk along the edge of the run. Willow runs up to them (obviously with the mesh between them) and either stares at them until they run off or sits in front of them grooming herself! I've seen her do it many times.
 
The magpies don't bother ours here: there's loads of youngsters chuckling around here at the moment :) They used to try and poke Charlie through the mesh but he could give a well-aimed kick so, being smart birds, they didn't bother him again ;P
 
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