Bleak midwinter: In the bleak midwinter wild birds are struggling to find food when the ground is frozen hard and berries are covered with frost and snow. Birds need high-calorie food and fresh water to survive the freezing weather — here’s how you can help them.

  • Feed the birds twice a day, usually early in the morning and late afternoon. They will soon get to know when you are ‘laying the table’, and will flock in to give you a close-up view of wildlife.
  • Put out fresh water every day for birds to drink from and bathe in. A stone in the dish or bird bath may stop the water freezing so quickly.
  • Make an apple bird feeder. Slice the top off an apple and scoop out the centre. Mix this in a bowl with bird seed and lard, and then stuff the mixture into the apple. Push a garden cane through the middle of the stuffed apple and place it in the ground.
  • Chop up apple and pear cores. Spread them under shrubs where the ground is less frozen and it is easier for small birds to feed.
  • Make bird biscuits. Roll out left-over pastry mix, cut into shapes and brush with egg yolk, decorate with sunflower seeds and make a small hole for string. Bake the biscuits until golden. When they are cool, thread string through the hole and hang up in trees.
  • Birds like a variety. Porridge, breadcrumbs, cooked rice and pasta, grated cheese and cooked potatoes are all popular on the bird table.
  • Order bird food from Vine House Farm and support local wildlife. Vine House Farm in Lincolnshire donates to BBOWT five per cent of the value of purchases made by people living in Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire.

Natural decorations: At Sutton Courtenay Environmental Education Centre in Didcot we have been busy making natural decorations. They are fun and colourful with bright red holly berries and dark green fir woven into golden willow stems.

To make Christmas door-wreaths, use freshly cut young (first- or second-year growth) willow stems two-to-three-metres-long and one-to-two-centimetres in diameter. Start by flexing and bending a single willow stem; the more you work it the easier it is to bend into shape. Make a rough circle the size you would like your wreath to be, and wind the end round, finishing it with a knot to hold in place. Place the second piece of willow with the thick end lined up about 15cm back from the first and weave it around the circle, trapping the end of the willow in a gap. Repeat this with new willow strands until the wreath reaches the required thickness.

Decorate it by threading in or tying on holly berries, ivy leaves, fir and pine cones.

Willow star decorations: Willow stars are fun and easy to make with children. Start with a thin piece of willow around 50cm long. Bend it into a zigzag shape with each bend 8cm from the last. Then fold it into a five-point star by weaving each side of the star into place.

Rustic tinsel: Dig out your collections of autumn treasures such as conkers, feathers, teasels and alder cones, and string them together on thick twine.

If you are collecting holly and other evergreen material, remember to ask the landowner’s permission first, and leave plenty behind for our feathered friends — you are taking bits of their winter homes and food larders.

Get involved: Find out where to see wildlife this winter on BBOWT’s nature reserves in Oxfordshire www.bbowt.org.uk Book a school visit to Sutton Courtenay Environmental Education Centre: 01235 862024 sceec@bbowt.org.uk Visit the events page on www.bbowt.org.uk for wildlife discovery days for all the family.