Know Your Tits!

And join in with the Big Garden Birdwatch this weekend

Walking along the river yesterday I noticed some blue tits going about their business. It seems a bit early for them to build a nest, but perhaps they were checking out the real estate in preparation for spring. The longer I stood still watching the blue tits, the more birds I spotted. Great tits hopping from branch to branch, a busy jay dazzling in the sunlight and a cormorant gliding silently over the river. 

This got me thinking… since it’s RSPBS’s Big Garden Birdwatch this weekend, now seems like a good time to introduce you to three of the most common tit species in Britain. They’re all familiar visitors to our parks, gardens and birdfeeders and I’ve seen all of them along that same stretch of river.

Here, I’m going to introduce you to a great tit, a blue tit and a long-tailed tit, but you may also see coal tits, crested tits, bearded tits, marsh tits or willow tits, depending on the habitat you’re in.

Did you know?

A new study conducted at King’s College London found that seeing or hearing birds is associated with an improvement in mental wellbeing that can last up to eight hours!

Blue Tit (Cyanistes caeruleus)

The Eurasian blue tit is one of the UK’s most common birds, which I think means we often take them for granted. Look closely though, and you’ll see that they are really beautiful and brightly coloured. 

Blue tits are acrobatic little birds you may spot hanging upside down from branches, which they do to access insects or seeds. In winter you’re likely to see them teaming up with other tit species as they search for food.

Did you know?

Like all birds, blue tits can see ultraviolet light! The front of their heads glow under UV light, and studies indicate this is how females choose their partners ­– apparently they prefer males with the brightest heads!

Feed the birds

Blue tits are regular visitors to garden bird feeders. If you want to attract them to your own patch, try mixed bird seeds, whole shelled peanuts, suet balls and sunflower hearts. Remember to regularly clean your feeders and provide fresh water!

Great Tit (Parus major)

Great tits are the UK’s largest tits (I give you full permission to giggle at that fact!). They are woodland birds that have adapted to man-made habitats and are now familiar garden visitors. You may have seen them being rather aggressive at your bird feeder, fighting smaller tits off. 

You can tell adult males and females apart by the width of the black stripe that runs down the centre of the chest – in females this stripe tapers off near the belly, but in males it broadens to a wide patch between the legs (which you can just about see in my illustration of a male). It is said that the bolder and wider the stripe males have, the more dominant they are.Young birds have a yellow ‘wash’ over their plumage, their wings are more green than blue and their cheeks are yellow rather than white.

Did you know?

Great tits feed on seeds in winter and invertebrates (like caterpillars, spiders, grasshoppers and flies) in spring and summer. Their bills actually change shape in between seasons to help them adapt to each food type!

Great tit one man bands

While great tits have an easily recognisable ‘tea-cher, tea-cher’ song, it is also often said that if you don’t recognise a bird call, it’s likely to be a great tit, since they have a large vocabulary. 

Each male has an average of four song types which they can sing at three different tempos to give the impression that their territory is more occupied than it really is (to discourage competitors). Male great tits with larger vocabularies tend to be more dominant and therefore breed more successfully. Charlie from Birdsong Academy included the great tit in his Shriek of the Week Substack series recently, and compared the great tits’ defence strategy to Kevin making it look like he’s throwing a party in Home Alone - what a great analogy.

Shriek of the Week: Great Tit

Long-Tailed Tit (Aegithalos caudatus)

Long-tailed tits are easily recognisable because (you guessed it!) they have a very long tail, which is actually longer than their bodies. Adults have distinctive badger-like facial markings and young birds look like they’re wearing a black bandit mask. Long-tailed tits have an undulating flight (similar to woodpeckers and several other birds) and you’ll usually spot them in busy flocks of about 20 birds.

I always think long-tailed tits wouldn’t look out of place in a Disney film. They huddle together at night to keep warm and their nests look like sleeping bags made from moss – cute! Long-tailed tits line their nests with up to 1,500 feathers to make it soft for their eggs and camouflage their breeding sites with cobwebs and lichen. What brilliant parents!

Did you know?

Long-tailed tits are ‘cooperative breeders’. Individual pairs try to rear their own young, but if they fail, they’ll help close relatives out at their nests instead. Only eight percent of bird species are thought to do this!

Open your ears

Get to know the long-tailed tit’s call and you should be able to spot them more easily, as they’re very vocal little birds. They make regular contact calls that sound a bit like a high pitched whistle, as well as more subtle rattly-sounding calls.

Long-tailed Tit

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Sources and Further Reading:

Wildlife Trusts Profiles: Blue Tit / Great Tit / Long-Tailed Tit

RSPB Profiles: Blue Tit / Great Tit / Long-Tailed Tit

Birdsong Academy’s Shriek of The Week: Great Tit / Long-Tailed Tit / Coal Tit

Lucy Lapwing’s Birdsong Lessons: Blue Tit / Great Tit

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RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch

Don’t forget to join in with the RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch this weekend. All you need to do is spend an hour watching the birds in your patch (it can be your garden, your balcony or a local park), between 26th and 28th January, and record the birds that land. Then you need to tell RSPB what you saw (even if you saw nothing at all) by submitting your results online or via post. Every bird you do – or don’t – count will give RSPB a valuable insight into how garden birds are faring in the UK. For more info click here. 

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