The urban bird clinched number one spot in a survey to find which of our feathered friends paid us the most flying visits.

More than 9,600 eagle-eyed twitchers across Peterborough and Cambridgeshire took part in the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds' (RSPB) nationwide Big Garden Birdwatch.

Hot on the starlings' heels, house sparrows were ranked second – with 4.32 per garden spotted – followed by blackbirds.

Numbers of colourful finches visiting gardens over winter are flourishing, with counts at a five year peak.

However, overall garden bird numbers are at their lowest over the same period.

Nationally, the results show the average number of birds seen in each garden has dipped by a fifth since 2004. For the first time in the survey's 29-year history, the striking siskin made it into the Top 20.

Scarcer finch species such as brambling and redpoll also made more appearances.

Birdwatcher and Peterborough Bird Club recorder Brian Stone also took part in the survey - with sparrows coming out top in his garden.

He said: "Peterborough is fortunate from the birds' point of view because we have good farmland around here that will provide them with good feeding.

"You often see large flocks of birds in the fields, so they don't come into gardens so much if they can find food elsewhere."

The RSPB's Dr Andre Farrar said: "It's definitely been a good winter for finches.

"Many of them are here because of food supplies. The increase in bramblings, up by two thirds in the last five years, reflects the scarcity of beech seed known as 'mast' in northern Europe and Scandinavia – if the mast crop is poor in these countries, we see more of them here in our gardens.

"Along with siskin increases, numbers of redpolls seen in gardens have skyrocketed.

Again this is probably due to supply of food – both birds feed on conifers and deciduous seeds, so the figures suggest that tree seed supplies have been poor this year and they've been forced into gardens to find food."

As predicted, the colourful goldfinch made it in to the UK top 10 for the first time, with a third more birds recorded than in 2004.

Over the weekend of January 26 and 27 , almost 400,000 people counted more than six million birds across 228,000 UK gardens.

The house sparrow retained its UK top spot – however its numbers have dwindled by almost two thirds since 1979.

The Top 10: Cambridgeshire
Starling 4.97 (average number of birds seen per garden)
House sparrow 4.32
Blackbird 2.95
Collared dove 2.58
Chaffinch 2.08
Blue tit 1.83
Woodpigeon 1.38
Robin 1.30
Great tit 1.21
Greenfinch 1.21

Top 10 in the UK
1. House sparrow
2. Starling
3. Blackbird
4. Blue tit
5. Chaffinch
6. Woodpigeon
7. Collared dove
8. Robin
9. Great tit
10. Goldfinch
Full results from www.rspb.org.uk/birdwatch/results/top10.asp.

Factfile: the starling

• the official Latin name of the starling is sturnus vulgaris.


• Smaller than blackbirds, with a short tail, pointed head and triangular wings, starlings look black at a distance but when seen closer they are very glossy with a sheen of purples and greens.


• Their flight is fast and direct and they walk and run confidently on the ground.


• Noisy and gregarious, they spend a lot of the year in flocks.


• The starlings belong to the superfamily Muscicapoidea, together with thrushes, flycatchers and chats, as well as dippers

Related external links:
RSPB: Big Garden Birdwatch 2008.

wildlifeextra.com: RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch – 2008 Results.