It feels like it’s been a long time since I’ve posted pictures of our more common birds so I’m starting with a couple of standard images of a blue tit and a greenfinch.

The greenfinch felt like something of a treat. These ought to be very common birds around here but I don’t think I’ve seen too many recently. Their numbers are severely affected by Trichomonosis, a disease which can trigger rapid declines and is often spread through feeding sites. This one looked healthy though.

I have photographed (and seen) plenty of magpies. These are flourishing, along with all the local corvids. I took this short sequence of a magpie taking a bath at lunchtime.

On the home front, Pretty is carrying a typical fox injury… she’s limping. It seems she’s cut her rear right lower leg. She is putting weight on it when she stands, but carries it when she’s negotiating steps. Leg injuries are extremely common among foxes, and a survey in Bristol some years ago found that 30% of year old foxes had a healed fracture and that this figure rose to 70% for foxes that reached five years. Clearly they don’t always look before they leap. We will, as always, keep an eye on Pretty, but I’m sure she’ll be fine. Just about every fox we’ve seen over the past 8 or so years has sported similar injuries at one time or another.

Camera note: all bird photos taken with the Canon 7D and EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L USM IS lens. Limping fox taken with the EF 24-105 F4L IS USM lens.