We get lots of fieldfares and redwings every winter. The fieldfares specialise, along with the blackbirds, in polishing off the windfall apples up to Christmas. I tell myself they're fertilising the stand of apple trees I have, and I do get great crops every year in spite of having added nothing by way of fertiliser for 20 years. There are far more songthrushes around than last winter, and lots of tell-tale smashed snail shells - I reckon the thrushes are hunting out the hibernating molluscs. I haven't seen any unusual birds so far but the regulars are desperate for food (and water in the freeze) and are far bolder around me than usual when I'm out filling the feeders. The biggest entertainer is a male greater spotted woodpecker who sounds like a ram-raider trying to get into the house when he's hammering on the window feeder. I had to buy a new one the other week as he managed to completely wreck the previous one. A couple of days ago we had blue, great, coal and long-tailed tits all frenetically together at once on the bird table. We've only been getting long-tailed tits for about three years but now we have a regular mob of seven or eight which visits several times a day. I saw a bullfinch up the lane the other day - not a very common sight around here. There are barn owls around but I'm concerned that I haven't seen one for three or four months now.