Blue tits removing bedding??

[gpjayne]

Hi, I have a nesting box by my front window which has been claimed by a pair of Blue Tits, however, over the past few days I have seen 4 Blue tits in and around the box.
There appears to be very little fighting, but I have watched one set go in with nesting material and then a short while later seen what I think is another tit remove the material.

They are all very similar and I cannot easily identify the different blue tits, could I be seeing things or is something more sinister occuring??

Thanks
Jayne

[Elizabeth B]

It's (usually) the female bluetit that does all the nest building - I say usually because we've been watching bluetits nesting since 2001, and had never seen the male helping until a week or so ago. The female was in the box, and the male took in a piece of hay and presented it to her - we think she might have ben expecting a titbit, but she did take the offering from him. This was repeated again later.

I'm surprised that there has been no fighting if you have four birds around the box. We had a battle a little while ago between two females in Box 1 - this is described in our diary for Monday 29th March. The next page describes how the female in Box 2 is taking nesting material in and out again very frequently - and this has been going on for several days!

[gpjayne]

Thanks for that Elizabeth, it's my first bird box and my daughter is now telling me I need to get out more!

I have already added your site to my favourites.

Many Thanks

Jayne

[pinkwheels]

I discovered this morning (10mins ago) that a blue tit (not sure if it was the nest builder) was shredding nesting material outside the nest and there's more to be seen hanging out of the bird box hole. They appeared to have completed nesting and have been seen mating. Any clues as to what's going on? This the third season of the box being used, the first, young were abandoned, but last year was a success. This isn't looking good!!

[gpjayne]

My Bluetit is still building her nest- how long does it take???

The male is very attentive and regulary checks what she is doing.

The other Bluetits that I saw have nested in a crack in the old stone wall at the bottom of the garden directly next to the gate. They are only about 10 feet away from the nest box, but they appear to be getting on very well.

[Elizabeth B]

It can take as little as three days, but is usually much longer than this. Have a look at the Overview page of our bluetit website - this shows dates of the significant events in our boxes since 2001.