A starling eyes up the fruity suet pellets in the bird feeder - a food that these birds seem particularly fond of. In reality they are a bit too big to feed easily from the feeder and have to steady themselves with much flapping of wings but this does not put them off. Usually there are several here at once resulting in noisy squabbles. The padlock protects the food from the local squirrels who have found a way to open the top of the supposedly squirrel-proof feeder. Even so one enterprising squirrel worked out that by upending the feeder (requiring considerable agility and dexterity) it could shake the contents out to then be collected from the ground. This has led on occasion to a spat with a marauding magpie keen to get its own share of the spoils.
As a postscript to the story of the newt catcher in:
SP4774 : Newt Catcher, near Bilton No great crested newts were caught, although a number of common newts and a couple of grass snakes were captured. The scheme was criticised by local farmers as a huge waste of money, although a council spokesman claimed that the exercise had been worthwhile.