Send this page to a friend

Birdcam

Bye Bye Blue Tits!

On Saturday 26th May 2007, first one brave little blue and yellow bird emerged from its warm and cozy nest, followed by one two three and four of its brothers and sisters. The Blue tits at Severn Valley County Park ventured out into the big wide world!

From now on the parent birds will continue to feed the young birds for around a week, during this time they will be taught how to fend for themselves. The young Tits are easily distinguishable by their cute yellow faces, in contrast to the parents who have white faces and more defined markings.

But why did some die?

Blue tits are mass producers of eggs, ten eggs being the average clutch. Their 'big clutch' strategy forms part of their plan to combat natures 'natural wastage'. Large numbers of eggs are laid so that one or two will survive and breed the following year.

Tits feed mainly on caterpillars in the tree canopies, the rain brought bad news for our brood as it washed the caterpillars out, the rain itself was also a problem (birds cannot get too wet), together with the drop in temperature, the combination meant the weakest and smallest of the birds did not survive. If the rain had kept off another few days they may have had a chance as when the largest young had fledged the parents would have continued to feed the smaller ones. Having said that it was and excellent year for tits as there was very high take up of boxes here at Severn Valley Country Park.

Rest assured we will be back again with more hatchlings in the future!!

Selection of previous images

Here are a selection of images from the webcam as we chart the development of the nest. Clicking on a picture will enlarge it to it's full size. You will then need to click the back button to return to this page.

Video

Here's a short video of the chicks being fed. The clip requires Adobe Flash Player to be installed and has no audio commentary on it. Please note, to watch the video a second or third time you need to press the stop button  and then the play button.

Other webcam

Birdcam isn't our only webcam we also have our River Severn webcam looking from High Town to Low Town in Bridgnorth