A Blue Tit Nesting Box on the edge of Dartmoor, Buckfastleigh, Devon. UK.
She laid her eighth egg
on the 28th April, she has laid one egg everyday, twelve
days later, the first Egg hatched at 0730 on the 9th May,
on the 10th May 2011
The Blue Tits left the nest at 5.00am on Sunday29th May
2011
We are providing the bird
table with cornflakes, grated cheese, muesli, porridge oats, fruit, bread and
butter, bread and dripping, mixed seeds, and fat balls. The blue tits will feed
the chicks on grated cheese and fat ball, apart from the grubs and caterpillars
they find in our fir tree, giving them a rich supplement as they have done in
previous years.
We are
currently receiving about 200 birds per day on the table which include:-
rooks, magpies, jackdaws, black birds, house sparrows, tree sparrows,
chaffinches, bullfinches, coal tits, greenfinches, robins, pigeons and doves.
After removing the nest, we found it to contain moss, small
twigs, hair, feathers, cotton wool, cobwebs and small leaves. At the deep end (the back) it was 50 mm deep at the front
15 mm, the nest its self was 100mm X 100 mm.
We all see Blue Tits in our garden at
some time of other, but we almost never see what goes on inside their home.
We have a bird box in our garden and because of my electronic background, have
had video cameras in the box for many years, I have also created a website for
the world to see. This website carries video diaries since 2006 and a fresh
picture of the nest every five seconds.
This year we had Coal Tits, Great Tits and Blue Tits regularly visiting our
bird box, this started back in February, by the middle of March it was in
doubt that the Great Tits would be staying even though they were in and out of
the box several times a day. Then for a couple of weeks nothing visited, and
we thought that like last year we would have not takers. Then the Blue Tits
came back. We took a chance on the size of the box and entrance hole several
years ago, as it is fairly critical, it should be 27 mm for a Blue Tit , 25 mm
Coal Tit, and 34 mm for the Great Tit, we decided to make our box with a 34 mm
hole, this would allow all three types of bird in but not Sparrows.
The Male was very keen, and you could see that he was trying to encourage his
wife to take an interest in the box, but she did not seem to want to stay. It
is the practice of the male to provide food for his wife, and this he did, but
he would only give her food in the box. She would take the food then
immediately leave the box and go off and play. She was not in any hurry to
set-up home at this time.
On the 2nd April, we noticed that the odd moss in the bird box, by the 8th
April it was clear that they were building a nest, but she was very lazy, and
would only work on the nest from 8 till 10 in the morning, this made the male
very cross, he would bring her food and feed her in the box, and eventually
resorted to collecting moss and cat hair, bringing it into the box and
throwing it at her to encourage her to make a decent home for his kids.
At this point we thought she might be a case for Social Services if there is
such a thing for birds. As we approached the 15th April, she suddenly decided
to work a little harder and was in and out of the box for most of the day, we
could see the nest coming into shape.
We hung some cotton wool in the garden arch; this was ignored until the 18th
of April, when suddenly the whole lot was taken into the box.
Until this point in time they only worked during the day and never stayed at
night, this we have always found a little odd and the box is made out of
sturdy wood, warm and dry, we have no idea where they go at night but probably
they have some regular hideaway in a hedge or wall somewhere.
Incidentally the male never sleeps in the box, and stays in the tree keeping
guard on his home and wife.
On the 18th April at 7.30pm she went into the box and settled down for the
night, we could hear her moving about in the dark so we knew that she was
still in there, the following morning we could hear the male in the tree
calling her, but she did not want to leave the warm box.
At about 8am, she left the box and I could see that she had laid her first
egg, I turned the light on in the box and took 30 seconds of live video where
the egg could be clearly seen, this was very timely as she came back about 15
minutes later and covered the egg over with cotton wool and moss. She laid a
second egg the following night, this she will do until she has laid somewhere
between 8 and 12 eggs.
This is where they get cleaver, as she will not start to incubate her eggs,
which takes 12 days to hatch, until she has laid the last one, or until the
time is right.
In previous years we have seen this all happen before and the hatching of the
eggs has to co-inside with the little grubs that we have hanging in the fir
tree.
We expect the eggs to hatch in sometime in the second week of May. In 2006, it
was 18th May. 2007 it was the 9th May and 2008 15th May and in each case the
eggs all hatched in the same day, this way the chicks are all the same age
give or take a few hours and they all grow up together.
The average nest will have about ten chicks and the parents will provide about
one thousand meals per day for the 19 day till they leave the nest.
We have started our video diary for everyone to see on http://buckfastleigh.org
this website also has records and video for the past 5 years, together with
additional information.
If you are thinking of putting a bird box in your garden, then you need to do
this at the end of September, as most birds will start house hunting from
October onwards. They will constantly check all through the winter and they
will make they decision in the early spring. They are very successful at doing
this as they have been doing this for millions of years.
After removing the nest from 2008, we found it to contain moss, small twigs,
hair, feathers, cotton wool, cobwebs and small leaves. At the deep end (the
back) it was 50 mm deep at the front 15 mm, the reason for this is to stop the
chicks falling out of the box until they are old enough and big enough to
climb to the hole, the nest its self was 100mm X 100 mm.
