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Saturday 3 February 2024

Bird Feeders & Bird Baths Set Up In My Shetland Garden!

My front garden overlooks Scalloway Castle and Harbour
 The Lodgepole Pine tree you can see, is in the garden of the lovely people who sold me this house

 

Its been another very busy day. The builders turned up at 8.30am again and finished the second coat of paint in my office and put up some white cast iron brackets in my patio area to hang bird feeders from – they had gone by 9.30am! They will come back again when my coat hook racks arrive, bathroom cabinet etc, so these can be put up.

I was going to put my bird feeding station up tomorrow, as I needed to go on the bus into Lerwick today to make my final decision on the carpet for the office, but I couldn't resist doing this now. The RSPB Feeding Station that I purchased before I moved to Shetland, in preparation for when I bought my own place, is brilliantly designed. I was putting this together and trying to read the instruction sheet in a hail storm! I decided not to put the clear plastic bowl in the metal loop as it would have blown away in seconds. The long prongs at the base of the pole were tough to push into the ground, but it got easier when I lumped each of the four prongs with a big lump of rock. Margaret popped round (previous owner) to collect a bin in the shed that I didn't want and she seemed surprised at how much I had unpacked and how lovely the kitchen looked now, it does indeed!

It didn't take long at all for 50+ Starlings to empty all feeders! I was overjoyed to watch a Robin having a little bathe in one of my bird baths and also a Blackbird later on. Had a quick lunch and then headed off to the bus stop to go to Lerwick and headed straight to one of the three carpet shops and then to the second one, which is a long walk away. Its probably 30 years ago that I have ordered and purchased carpet for a room, but still, I was very shocked at the huge cost increase.

I have whittled it down to:

https://www.manxtomkinson.co.uk/product/tomkinson-tweed-shetland/

This is my favourite as it represents the colour of sand I was looking for and the colour is called "Shetland"!!! I didn't order either today as was so shocked by the price.

OR:

https://www.lifestyle-floors.co.uk/product-detail/cottage-berber/nutmeg

Got some food items from the Co-op and stood in an open bus stop shelter with others, as it lashed down with rain. The bus driver kindly dropped me off at the bottom of my road, which helped enormously with carrying shopping up the hill. With no car now (I noticed it is still in the garage grounds and still not picked up yet) its difficult to get certain things done, oh well.

2 comments:

  1. Glad you've got the birdfeeders up, surprised it took you that long, we'd have had them up on the first day, haha! On the carpets, the second one is a better colour for keeping clean looking, it's actually the same colour and type as we have throughout our house. But I'd advise you not to go for pure wool, it's lovely but it will attract clothes moths and they'll eat their way through it if there are any about. Unless it's got some sort of preservative on it of course. What's the office floor like? Would it be better just to get a large rug, it would save a lot of expense at this stage. Looking forward to seeing the pictures!

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  2. Wow, you are WELL above the town.... when I looked on street view, it gave no real indication of that gradient.
    I put a "seed saver" bowl on our big 6-hole seed feeder and it was exactly the opposite... the wind blew the feeder around so much that it was shaking the feed out of the slots... and no sensible bird would go near it... nor the neighbouring feeders that it was colliding with... it came off almost as rapidly as it went on!!
    It has been waiting in the to-do box in the workshop for some legs and can eventually, become a ground feeder.

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