See our previous blog entry for Saturday 13 January for more information about the nest boxes put up by Friends of Adel Woods and the results of the first part of our survey.
After Saturday, we nominally had nine boxes to survey – nominally because two seem to have disappeared without trace over the years.
Despite an inch of snow over night, and a forecast of further snow or sleet this morning, Steve and I met up to finish the job, despite my misgivings. However, I need not have worried: it turned out to be a lovely day – the snow quickly thawed, it didn’t rain, and the sun even came out!
We surveyed six tit boxes and the tree creeper nest box.
Four of the tit boxes contained completed tit nests, and the other two contained what seemed to be incomplete nests. One of the tit boxes had been used by nuthatches because they had started to seal the gaps around the lid with mud. However, the nest inside was a typical tit nest, not a nuthatch nest, so it looks as if the nuthatches may have been driven off by some aggressive blue tits or, more likely, great tits. Interestingly, exactly the same thing happened with this nest box last year.
Tree creeper nest box
The treecreeper box is a bit unusual. Tree creepers are so called because they creep up the side of tree, looking for bugs to eat (incidentally, unlike nuthatches, they can’t creep down trees, and when they get to the top of a tree they have to fly off to the bottom of the next one). They nest high up in small gaps behind the bark of trees, and the tree creeper nest box is intended to offer something similar to the gap behind bark. It is about twice the depth of a tit box, and the entrance is on the side of the box, near the bark of the tree. Here is a link to a nice video of a tree creeper nesting in a hide: tree creeper. Click on the video “tree creeper huddle”.
The tree creeper box was used for nesting, but the nest in the bottom of the box was a typical tit nest. Looking at the photograph of the tree creeper box, it is amazing to think of young tit fledglings having to climb a foot (or 30 centimetres) up the inside of the nest box to reach the exit to the outside world.
Another very interesting and enjoyable morning.
Friends of Adel Woods 