Blogger: Jon Haw, Reserves Manager
Got a question for us then give us a shout either here on our blog or find us on Twitter or Facebook under RSPBintheEast. The other day we had this inquiry from Tina:
Can anyone help with a question?
I have a bird box on the side of my house with a camera set up inside. I had blue tit's going in and out last year and they started to build, but then abandoned it so I cleaned it out as winter began, and at Christmas I thought I would just turn the camera on and to see if there was anything in it. To my amazement there was a bird in there! I think it is a blue tit (although this was hard to tell as it was on night vision) and she/he comes in to sleep EVERY single night and then leaves at dawn! He/she has not put any bedding in there, it's just the bird and is in there every night just to sleep (and poo!)! Is this normal????I really wanted to see them nesting and watching little babies hatch etc and would be wonderful for my 3 year old to see, but I don't think this will happen if this little bird keeps coming and using it as a hotel at night! I would love to hear what you think!
Birds often use nest boxes in winter to roost. Essentially birds look for a relatively warm safe place and that could be a tree hole, wall crevice. under the roof tiles of a house that may have been a nesting place in previous years ...or old nest box. In my house and garden I have a great tit that sleeps under the tiles on the conservatory, a blue tit that squeezes in to a hole in the woodwork on the garage and a wren that goes into the shed through the broken window to roost in an old wrens nest.
I have witnessed this behaviour in old nest boxes quite often and there are various records of different species utilising boxes. Sparrows will use old house martin nests. Wrens don’t nest in closed fronted boxes but are commonly recorded roosting in boxes - often up to a dozen or more in one box. I think there is a record of as many as thirty, in one standard bird box. They get the added bonus of mutual warmth too. Blue tits and great tits will often roost on their own but rarely in 2’s and 3’s
Will they nest this year....??? Yes. Chances are a pair of blue tits or great tits will set up regardless of any winter squatters. They’ll evict any single birds. It has been a rather funny year with the cold so they may not even have got down to nesting yet. It’s all tied in with caterpillar populations ....they need to be emerging as the blue tit youngster are hatching.
Hope that helps all you folk giving nature a home this Spring.
Ray Kennedy (rspb-images.com)