Robins nesting on our patio

How lovely!

How exciting they are usually pretty good at picking a nest site..

How lovely Grannyknot and a sure sign that spring is on it's way. I was reading that they start their courtship in January and can have up to three or five broods per year each of four or five eggs so if they are successful you could be in for a population explosion in your garden.
Just hope for the best weatherise as they may be a bit short of insect food just now. Good job you are keeping an eye on them.

Love the "in earth colours". Always good to encourage a good nursery colour scheme.

You're so lucky, Grannyknot. We don't like to encourage birds to nest in our garden since the year before last we had a brood of five blackbirds that were systematically murdered by the neighbourhood cats as soon as they were out of the nest and vulnerable. It broke our hearts. We were delighted when they had managed to raise a brood as the previous season they had abandoned seven eggs. Last year they didn't come back at all. I hope your robins fare better and that you enjoy their progress to parenthood!

My worry about the mild weather we have had is that animals and plants are moving into spring mode too early and there could still be some very severe weather to come which could be very bad for small creatures and plants.

greyduster there are lots of cats in our neighbourhood. If this nesting session goes well, I shall have a water pistol at the ready.

Thanks everyone for your interest

nellie that worries me too ...

Hope they all survive, Grannyknot, they're our favourite birds.
We have one, or maybe two, who live in the barn and I put food out for them.
Another predator we've seen is a sparrowhawk - I wonder if they take robins? I hope not.

We had goldcrest nesting in our conifer and I spotted next door's cat sitting at the bottom of the tree. After shooing it away, I wrapped chicken netting around the trunk loosely, so it was jutting out at an angle to the trunk.

It worked a treat.

That's so exciting!! We have a family of robins that drops by for afternoon suet bits and to have their photo taken. Currently it's just mum and dad and dads looking a bit ruffled so we've been putting out meal worms.

To have them nesting would be lovely.

We have tons of birds up here in the moutains, but no long-tailed tits and no robins. I really do miss those robins- they used to appear and follow me all over the garden when I was out- knowing I would turn over the earth when weeding, etc, and would always throw them all the liitle worms I found. Soooo sweet. Enjoy,

Can you place an old reversing mirror or similar in the right position to see in the house and nest later?

We had robins nesting in a box opposite outside our conservatory window last year - unfortunately we went away just before they must have fledged so missed the main excitement. Nothing this year so far though.
It's magpies that are the worst problem around here although we do have visiting cats

I have some soft natural wool but it's blue what if they are girls?

jalima my grandson's nursery colour scheme is lemon and pale grey no blue in sight!

4 yrs ago a robin found a gap above our shed door and made a nest in the shed , both of them flying in and out and ducking through the gap to go in and out to feed the babies. We went on holiday for a few days and the babies fledged while we were away, on our return I went down the garden opened up the shed door quietly not realising and they had obviously not been clever enough to perform the acrobatics needed to negotiate the gap above the door so had been 'trapped' in the shed , everything was covered in Robin poo but at least they all survived and flew out as soon as I retreated.
I did manage to get a couple of snaps of them in the nest I'll try to post them but I think they might be saved on my old PC I'll have to investigate.

Please update us as things progress Grannyknot

Grannyknot - how exciting! We too have a cat problem & have a very large water pistol ready at all times. A pair of bluetits have been looking at a bird box we put up two years ago and it's rent free so we're hoping they approve. Our robins like a fat/seed filled coconut but we found it needs to be positioned so they can stand on something. Good luck & hope you keep us updated!

How do you tell a female robin from a male?

I'm not sure you can phoenix, I've never seen a difference.

Phoenix it's in the way they wear their hair (the hairline):
"You read that male and female robins are identical, but this is not the case – there is a difference, but it is slight and because robins often stand side-on when they’re watching us, it isn’t easy to see. The difference is seen in what can be described as the ‘hairline' and is clearly shown in the linked photographs here; the female bird’s hairline is ‘V’ shaped and the male’s is ‘U’ shaped".

Oops meant to delete the bit about the photographs but didn't, so as to avoid confusion, here's the link I copied ^^ from:

mygarden.rhs.org.uk/blogs/miranda_hodgson/archive/2013/02/20/how-to-tell-a-male-robin-from-a-female-robin.aspx

tanith what luck for the fledglings that you returned in time!

I've bought mealworm for my pair, banana and a suet block. Anything to entice them.

Lovely stories, gknot and tanith.

Well I didn't know that about male and female robins - I thought the females were all brown. So now I think we probably do have a pair.

It was once thought that the wren was the blackbird's mate - Robin redbreast the male and Jenny wren the female.