Garden Birds

I have spent a fair amount of time lately watching the feeding behaviour of the species attending my garden feeding station.

The Tit family are by far the most numerous attendees at the feeders. One thing I have noticed is that whilst a certain "pecking" order prevails amongst each species this does not seem to carry over between species. Its often the case that on the peanut feeders Great Tits will not tolerate another Great Tit on the same feeder but will allow Blue Tits to feed with no attempt to drive them off. By far the most aggressive species are Blue tits who seem to spend almost as much time squabbling as feeding. Coal Tits tend to nip in and out on the feeders as when a gap occurs during a squabble amongst the other species.

I have noticed a certain preference on the seed feeders in terms of choice feeding position. I have three medium defender seed feeders, these have two sets of feeding holes, one at the bottom and one midway up the feeder. Given the choice every bird without fail will chose to feed from one of the higher perches. I had thought this might be linked to a safety or pecking order aspect, i.e. the higher up the feeder the higher up the pecking order or safer feeding. I now think this is linked to ease of removing the food from the feeder and making a quick getaway back into the woods to eat the prize. When the feeders are full its harder to remove food from the bottom holes due to the weight of the food above compressing the seed and thus making extraction harder. The midway holes have less weight pressing down and are thus easier to grab a quick beak full from and scarper back into the woods. Birds will use all four feeding holes but if a bird vacates the midway feeding hole another bird will move immediately to this from the lower feeding hole. Coal Tits again lurk around waiting to grab food from the midway hole when a squabble creates a vacancy on the midway feeders. I need to fill the seed feeders daily as they are half emptied every day. I reckon I am feeding around a kilo of sunflower seed per day

On the ground I have at least three individual Blackbird Males and I think only one female. The boss male will drive off other males most of the time but occasionally all three males will feed amicable together (more on this later). I have at least two Nuthatches feeding throughout the day, never together, but I can pick out at least two individuals from the slightly different markings on each bird. They are very wary whilst feeding and are away at the slightest hint of an alarm call from the other birds. As I have mentioned before they spend the vast bulk of their time foraging on the floor for fallen seed which I suppose is exactly how they would feed out in the woods as seeds/nuts seem to be their main winter food source. I don't know how many of you have watched Nuthatches feed but they adopt a different method of feeding to peckers in the fact that when they do feed on the feeders they hammer at the nuts putting their whole body behind each blow rather than pecker style hammering with the head providing the hammer effect. Nuthatches NEVER use the seed feeder, even though they gather the sunflower seeds I put on the ground table and gather any spilt onto the floor from the feeders. I think this must be because they cannot grip the feeders to feed head down as they do on the nut feeders. I am going to fill one small wire nut feeder with sunflower seeds to see if they use this.

The strangest behaviour is by the Robins, I have still to work this out to my satisfaction but I think its linked in some way to the behaviour I mentioned about Blackbirds occasionally feeding together. The boss Robin has a very distinctive white feather on the outer edge of his wing (primary feathers ?). He/she is without doubt boss Robin in the garden and will drive off the other two Robins as soon as they appear. Just occasionally all three will feed amicably in the garden together ( my garden is only 12 X 15 feet). I think this happens when the weather is particularly poor with dropping temperatures causing the birds to concentrate on feeding first and squabbling later. The only time the boss male Blackbird will allow the others to feed without being driven off is in the same situation of falling temperatures/snow when I assume the need to stock up quickly with food overrides the territorial urge

I also have the odd Chaffinch male and the odd Greenfinch who I see occasionally on the seed feeders, but finches are in very short supply in the garden. A couple of Dunnock also appear on and off throughout the day. So far I have had visits by Greater Spotted Woodpecker on only one occasion and by Lesser Spotted on two separate occasions (sorry Nick they went before I had time to phone you)

Finally much to my surprise the busiest time of day on the feeders is from around 1pm until around 3.30pm. I would have assumed it would be first thing as soon as it was light enough for birds to be up and about. I think the Tit flocks build up as the day goes on as other birds move in from the woods from their roosts and thus more birds appear in the afternoon. I often have 20/30 individual tits on the feeders and floor at any one time and a quick count round the bushes near the garden will usually reveal around 40/50 birds in total when added to those actively feeding. Around 3.30-4pm things start to quieten down with just the occasional tit feeding and the last birds to feed well on into dark are Robins and Blackbirds who are also the first to appear every morning. I will no doubt change my ideas about the whys and wherefores of feeding behaviour in the garden as time passes, but nevertheless its fascinating to watch the birds for their behaviour as well as watching them for their sheer beauty.

PS.Can anyone point me in the right direction on the web etc to get some ideas on how to digiscope photos, the less technical the better please :-))