Blue Tits 2007

March 2007






14 March

Wonderful weather. 15°. A small technical problem does not allow knowing the number of visits today.

A lot of construction work today. She brings stuff all day.

Vue globale

A small bit of straw remained stuck in the entry, in her preceding passage. She alights one second on the branch of the birch located just opposite to the entry of the nesting box. And she leaves also a second for us to take a picture. In order to do not remain permanently behind the objective, we listen to the song of the titmouses and observe the male.     

When it arrives, she utters of tiny tsee tsee very soft and so announces her arrival. We just need to leave the window a little ajar to hear her.    

If he is there we can foretell her arrival by several seconds. He takes the usual parade: lowered wings, raised tail and sings facing her arrival direction.    

We always wonder about the source of moss and at the time of our walks in the neighborhood we make try to locate mossy places in the parks.

Mousse Mousse





MousseMousse





















Retournement








An upside down arrival.













The rest on the day is devoted to rearrange multiple times the nest stuff. Sometimes she does not like any more a bit of stuff. She takes and throws away the undesired tufts. This time we saw it clearly, but we did not succeeded to take it in a picture. But we could examine refused stuff thrown away at a small distance from the nest.

Matelas



Airing the mattress?


In reality this is the result of one of  the cleanings. The moss tuft remained stuck in the entry.    

A moment latter, she enters and put back the moss.












Piquer


Another favored activity:  try to enlarge the entry hole.

It pricks so much the wood inside that she succeeds in removing small pieces of wood.


















Décollage

Take off.





















15 March

Still another wonderful day.  15° C.

Today she does not do, she undoes. She continues to reject nest stuff.  

After inspecting the nest and packing the moss, she chooses a tuft and goes out to throw it away. I found two tufts.

Then, she roost on the box entry hole, pecks the wood, enters again and chooses the next tuft.

Is she a perfectionist? Is some of the stuff stingy or improper? Puzzler! She has her reasons. Put your work twenty times upon the anvil.    

Last year, we did not observe this behavior, but we were less equipped in March. We really began daily observation only since April.

Jeter








Penelope














Picture is not very good, but neither the shutter not me were fast enough.

She is not as his man who has difficulties to go throw the nest hole. She exits right away instantly. 

She has moss in the bill and moss stuck to the claws.

Sortie mousse

Inside view of tuft ready to be thrown away.













Intérieur565566

At the beginning of the afternoon, she has finished the house cleaning. She resumes her activities.

Mousse  






In the afternoon, long seance of wood picking.






















She shakes the rug and then packs the moss with a ribbon around the neck.

bcd

Watch VIDEO   (238Ko, 17s)



16 March

Weather a little overcast, a little misty, white clouds in the afternoon. 9°C.

Elle

Day devoted to gnaw the entry hole. It is 15h. Since this morning she pecks the entry wood. She enters now and then and returns to peck.















GrignoteA l'extérieur




At work from inside.

...and from outside.

She roost outside and passes the head inside twisting it to tackle the inner edge.





Roosted at the entry, she enters the head, works, and the raise the head and watches around. The she enters again the head. The consequence is that, each time,  she blocks the light inside the nest and the motion detector triggers a new picture of the empty nest. Today she took a lot of pictures!



Grignote324133




Wood pecking demonstration. We can see that she has tore down several small bits of wood.








In the afternoon, Penelope (I think that she is going to keep this name) gets rid of other moss tufts. Then both of them leave.



17 March

Overcast, cooler, 9°. About 100 visits.

The sparrows peck the prunus flowers, the titmouses the young catkins of the poplar and the tender buds of the birch. The flowers of primroses were tasted with eagerness by sparrows; there are no more flowers, only leaves. We understand why the Jardin des Plantes (Paris botanical garden) protected their primroses with nets.

Today it is the day for dry grass, which she brings during the day and, of course, at its favorite hour from 5 to 7.

HerbeHerbe

HerbeHerbeHerbe


18 March

Rain and strong wind all the morning. 8°C in the afternoon.    

Rain stops and the weather lightens in the afternoon.

Merle











A visitor of midday, a beautiful male black blackbird!












It posed there, relaxed, very long time. Merle

Merle


Clame
Penelope spends long moments to arrange its feathers and her nest and remains quietly and  thoughtful installed in the center of the nest.














19 March

Overcast and cold (3° the morning, 6° the afternoon). Strong wind from the NNW. Snow showers in the morning. This morning we did not see them much. When weather is bad with, like this morning, much wind, they are less present. But they pass by, on average, every 1/2 hour. 

14h: The afternoon the sky clears a little, there is always wind but weather lightens. Here they are. Activities resume. 

But we did not yet saw her bringing moss or grass, which must be quite wet today.

16h30: again very strong wind and hail, the weather is dark. Definitely bad day, the wind from the north is cool. 35 visits.

18h10 finally a moss tuft; quite small. Neither he nor she passed since more than one hour.

18h45: 7 visits to bring materials since 18h10. Only she works; he is not there.

19h: last visit, it makes almost night. This time he escorts her. They leave together.


20 March

Overcast, all gray and cold (2° in the morning). Strong and chilly wind.  

 Very few visits the morning.  Only one entry in the nesting box at 8h48, then nothing. Neither more songs.

At 10h45 the visits begin again. At the end of the morning, the Sun comes out and he starts to sing again.

In the afternoon the wind was calmed, the weather improves (8°C) and she does many trips to bring materials. She catches up the wasted time.

Herbe Brindilles











Watch VIDEO   (232Ko, 17s)



She shapes materials with her body, with this pretty movement of the wings.  Watch VIDEO   (646Ko, 50s).



Lui vers le nid

Here he is, hopping towards the nesting box, followed by his female. It goes to the door, sometimes clings and looks inside, then moves aside to let her pass.








Wind and bad weather start again at the end of the afternoon. The wind is almost full north and blows violently on our balcony.

 




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