Sad discovery on our nest box cam!

[werdnal]

We have a nestbox camera which we first put up last Christmas, and watched 2 successful broods raised last Spring; firstly a great tit family who, once fledged, were very quickly replaced by a pair of sparrows who also successfully raised a healthy brood.

This year we have been switching on every day or so to monitor who might be intending to use it, and for several weeks now a great tit has been roosting inside at night, bringing in the odd bits of moss, and displaying outside. Then a couple weeks ago, we noticed a sparrow had been taking an interest, calling outside and scrapping with the GT - I assume both these adults were from the nesting pairs last year, so both felt they had prior claim to the box.

Sadly we switched on earlier to see if anyone was "spending the night" and the great tit is lying dead in the box . Its difficult to tell in the IR b&w picture, but there are feathers strewn around so there has obviously been a scrap inside the box, and I guess the slightly larger and more aggressive sparrow overpowered him. I know its only nature, but still very sad to have such a loss so early in the year. We will remove the body in the morning, so atleast the sparrow can continue to use the box, to hopefully raise his family successfully this year.

What a shame!

[barquar]

That is very sad I like the Great Tits hope you get a replacement in your box.
How big is the hole in your box as 28mm is the norm for Great Tits,
Barquar