Daylight Robbery Prompts 'Owls Of Protest
Blue and great tits have long been recognised for their craftiness, but even our ecological experts and Barnsley Biodiversity Trust were left amazed when they came to carry out routine inspections of bird boxes at Langsett, near Sheffield.
Inside the boxes they found that the birds had treated themselves to a bit of an upgrade, furnishing their wooden abodes not with the usual nesting materials of moss, wool, feathers and hair, but with quality felt lining.
Now there's nothing the matter with being house - or box - proud, but when the felt in question has been appropriated without the consent of the previous owner, it's quite another matter.
A brief investigation by both teams into where the felt had originated from quickly led them to a number of nearby owl baskets, which were duly found to have been completely stripped of the felt lining, leaving just their wire mesh frame exposed.
And so the felt mystery began to unravel. In a brazen move to improve their own humble wooden homes, Langsett's blue and great tit population had clearly seen something they thought would make all the difference - and proceeded to acquire it with all the gusto of a bargain hunter during the January sales.
The crafty practice was uncovered last week as box clean-outs were carried out by the teams to ensure they are ready and fit for purpose come the start of the breeding season next year.
Long renowned for their ingenuity, blue tits have been known, especially during winter, to tear open the foil tops of milk bottles, drinking the top layer of milk. Groups of these ever-restless and inquisitive birds have even been known to follow milkmen or wait for milk deliveries.
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