Willow Tit stealing (1 Viewer)

[Richard Prior]

I'm fortunate enough to have Coal, Great, Blue, Marsh, Willow and Crested Tits visiting our feeders (species listed from most numerous visitors to least). Willow Tits tend to dash in to the garden, grab a seed from the feeder (or just as often from the ground beneath) and scoot off to store elsewhere, rather than consuming the food item in the vicinity of the feeder as the other tits tend to do. I read in British Birds September issue a letter about Willow Tits' caching behaviour so nothing strange there. The letter mentioned that the species appeared subdominant to Coal, Great and Blue Tits, so I was taken aback this morning to see a Willow Tit successfully steal sunflower seeds from Great, Blue and Coal Tits as they were opening them while perched in the branches of our plum tree. On around 10 occasions in 5 minutes the Willow Tit would arrive in the tree, locate a bird in the process of cracking open a seed between its toes, fly towards it (usually from below), grab the seed and fly off. The Great Tits seemed particularly targeted and offered no resistance to this 'smash and grab' raiding. I'm wondering whether the passivity of the birds originally in posession of the food item is linked to the fact that there's plenty of food provided and the weather is very mild, perhaps when the hard weather arrives such behaviour will provoke an agressive reaction towards this little criminal! Has anyone else seen Willow Tits do this so systematically?

 

[Nutcracker]

Never seen or heard of anything similar myself! A new behavioural mutation, which if successful and passed on to its offspring, could be a game-changer for the species?? Just hope it doesn't overdo it and start trying to steal from Sparrowhawks . . .

Unfortunately, I don't suppose it would reach Britain to help our subspecies out of its near-terminal decline.

 

[Torchepot]

Hi Richard

Your post prompted me to have another look at the tits visiting our feeding station. We get a similar range of species but the order of abundance is a bit different - a close call between blue and marsh with great hot on their heels (maybe that should be hind-claws), then crested and one or two coal tits visit daily. Long-tailed are regular in the garden but never come to the feeders - not even the fat balls.
We have willow tits very nearby (two pairs within 200 metres) but they very rarely visit the garden - maybe a couple of times a year. I've never seen them at the feeders or table even during the early days when we were getting through 25 kilos of sunflower seed a week. I used to study all the marsh tits hoping for willows to turn up, I would love to have both species together as I find them quite a challenge.
The last few days I've been studying our marsh tits again, hoping that the odd willow might be visiting, I suddenly noticed that despite their lightning quick (very frustrating) visits they are almost always snatching two or even three sunflower seeds. I didn't realise that they cache seeds too, though a quick internet search shows it's well documented.

Is your robber willow tit still at it?

Cheers

Phil