Features

Their colourful mix of blue, yellow and white make them one of the most attractive resident garden birds.

Blue tit facts

1. Between the First and Second World Wars milk delivery companies introduced aluminium milk bottle tops helping to keep the milk fresh on the doorstep.
2. It did not take long for the enterprising blue tit to discover how to get to the tasty cream inside the bottle by pecking a hole in the foil.
3. This phenomenon was first recorded in the 1920s and by the 1950s had spread throughout the British blue tit population.
4. In winter, blue tits often form flocks with great tits, long tailed tits and other woodland species as they search for food.
5. The blue tit was seen in 84% of gardens during the 2007 Birdwatch.

Attracting blue tits

• A peanut feeder in almost any garden will attract blue tits. Blue tits will also feed on seeds and scraps from bird tables.
• Blue tits are particularly partial to a fat ball hung in the garden. Ensure that any netting is removed from shop bought fat balls before you hang them to avoid these tiny birds getting there legs and feet trapped.
• Put up a nestbox. These provide hole nesting blue tits with a safe place to rear their young.
• Blue tits love gardens with plenty of trees and shrubs to dart about in. Plant trees, shrubs and climbers between late October and early March. Arrange large structural plants towards the back and middle of the bed and fill between with smaller plants towards the front.
• A garden with four to five blue tits at a bird table at any one time may actually be feeding 20 or more individual birds!