The robin is a chicken that’s synonymous with the festive season showing on the whole lot from Christmas playing cards, to presents, truffles, decorations and wrapping paper.
Instantly recognisable resulting from its red-breast, the robin, or an spideog, could be discovered all around the nation, and is maybe one of many nation’s favorite birds.
The robin, which is a member of the thrush household, has topped the desk within the Irish Garden Bird Survey run by BirdWatch Ireland for a number of years now, being reported in almost 100% of gardens.
Often known as “the gardener’s friend”, the robin is a well-recognized website when soil is being dug up revealing juicy earthworms.
The birds have been additionally identified to eat from a human’s hand, or faucet on a window or door in search of meals.
Robin
However, regardless of being perceived as a pleasant and almost tame widespread backyard chicken resulting from its obvious tolerance of people, the robin has a ferociously territorial aspect in terms of its personal type.
“The male and the female look exactly the same. So it’s difficult to know the difference between them, and the robins themselves don’t know the difference,” Irish biologist Éanna Ní Lamhna informed Agriland .
“If they see one other robin, they’re undecided and so they assume it’s one other male. They are extraordinarily aggressive birds. They can’t put up with one other robin on their territory.
“Robins will actually kill each other, they’re quite aggressive towards other robins, so what they’re doing on Christmas cards, I do not know, because we send cards with peace and goodwill to all men and we have a robin sitting on it,” Ní Lamhna laughed.
The robin could be very apparent presently of 12 months, as a result of it’s the one of many few birds that sings within the wintertime.
In the spring, male robins could be heard singing as a part of the daybreak refrain as they try to draw a feminine, whereas warning off every other rival males.
Robins will nest within the cowl of ivy and low shrubs away from predators just like the magpies, however have additionally been identified to decide on some uncommon places to lift their young, together with teapots and watering cans.
The chicken can also select to take up residence in a nesting field with a half door as an entrance.
Males breed twice in the summertime with the identical feminine, leading to as much as 8-9 chicks in a single season, which retains the general robin inhabitants secure.
Once the breeding season is over, female and male robins maintain separate territories and, unusually within the chicken world, each could be heard singing within the winter.
Festive season
Among the a number of connections between the robin and the festive season is a hyperlink again to Victorian Britain, when Christmas playing cards started to be mass produced and the “Penny Post” made the postal service available to odd folks.
At the time, Royal Mail postmen wore pink uniforms and earned the nickname “Robin Redbreasts”, due to this fact it’s unsurprising that the chicken grew to become a standard illustration on Christmas playing cards, representing those that delivered the cardboard.
There are additionally robust non secular connotations related to the robin by means of Christian folklore.
“One account is that the robin pulled the thorn out of Jesus’ head when he was on the cross to take away the ache, and the blood spilled on the robin and this gave it a pink breast. It was left with the pink breast as a mark of thanks.
“The different was that within the crib, the hearth was right down to very dangerous embers and slightly robin, who was afraid that it might get chilly and the newborn [Jesus] would die, fanned the embers with its wings and the embers burst into flames once more, and he bought scorched on the breast.
“So they’re both Christian emblems, one at the end of life and the one at the beginning of life, and they’re both acts of kindness done by the robin,” Ní Lamhna defined.
The chicken has additionally develop into a supply of nice consolation to those that have been bereaved, giving rise to the phrase, “when loved ones are near, robins appear”.
“It’s a lovely bit of consolation for people, and why not? We don’t know everything about the spirit world, and if they feel the robin is embodying the spirit of the person that’s gone and it gives them comfort, that’s a lovely tradition to have,” Ní Lamhna stated.
The biologist reminded Agriland readers to feed the birds, not simply the robins, over the winter months.
Robins are a giant fan of mealworms, however may even feed on scraps and seeds on the bottom or a tabletop, fairly than a chicken feeder.