Since we got our new camera, we have been neglecting Box1 and its potential occupiers. Today, however, this box has been the busy one and a picture from there this morning has got us concentrating on tails again.
If you remember, last year the female in Box1 was called Fantail because of her habit when the box was empty of sitting back propped up by her tail which as a result spread out like a fan. The picture on the left is of Fantail taken about this time last year.
If you want to read more about Fantail, look here.
And here is a picture of the female bird in the same box this year. Perhaps this is a common trait and we are reading too much into it, but could this bird possibly be Fantail? At least Fluffy has unmistakably proved that the same bird can occupy a box in two successive years!
(Incidentally, we hope you'll agree that the colour and general definition is better since we installed the extra lighting!)
This is the male. At least, he seems to be behaving in a male-bluetit-like way! He often comes into the box when it empty but vanishes immediately the other bird enters. However, he never seems to enter when the female is in the box. Both these behavioural traits seem to be those of a male.
His tail seems to be a bit unusual too!
So much so that I looked back at earlier picture of his tail to see if we had missed anything unusual before.
The image on the left was taken on 6th February and it certainly shows a bushy tail but at that stage, all the feathers seem to be there.
A couple of day's later, the tail hasn't changed much. (Both these pictures were taken before the lighting upgrade.)
This was taken while the male was on his way out - he has definitely lost a few feathers - but why? We're hoping he doesn't lose any more!
I think we should call him Neptune because his tail is shaped like a trident, but Elizabeth is not keen - any ideas?
Neptune in the box some time later.
This is the bird that may be Fantail - do you remember that she had a wide headband too?