Bluetit Diary    Apr 2006 (6)

This is the last picture I took today.  It rained a lot in the afternoon so perhaps that was the reason that she did not go into her nest box after mid afternoon.

After another day's work, the nest cup is starting to take on its round shape.

I hope she doesn't think that bare boards are good enough for her chicks!

Claire has suddenly started bringing in some finer material.  Here she pauses for a moment as if trying to decide where to put this beakful.

By the end of the afternoon, the floor of the nest box is covered with this fine material - it's not clear what it is but it looks most appropriate!

Claire roosts in the box for the first time! 

We have got so used to our birds not roosting in their box that we have been failing to keep an eye on them at the end of the day.  However, we suddenly noticed at about 8.15pm that Claire was in the box with her head tucked firmly under her wing.  We quickly turned the light off and left her to sleep in peace.

The next day, I installed a time switch to ensure that the light was turned off automatically at about 7.30pm.

While all this exciting stuff was happening in Box1, Kate was still at it in Box2!  Here we see Ben rewarding all her hard work with a tit-bit!

Unfortunately, for all her excited comings and goings, her nest now looks less complete than Claire's!

Claire can be well pleased with her handiwork.

When Elizabeth saw that Claire was looking for fine nesting material to complete her nest with, she decided to give her a helping hand.  She has some black lamb's wool which she stuffed into a terracotta pot and hung this on the pergola near the fat feeder.  Claire found it almost immediately and started a shuttle service between the pot and her nest box and using the wool to line her nest.

This is the state of the nest before Claire found the black wool.

Here she is with a beakful of the stuff!

This is the terracotta pot.  Elizabeth has filled it with the black wool and here Claire is trying to separate a long strand from the main body of the wool in order to take it back to her nest box.  She really has to work at it as it does not separate easily!

This is the nest box at the end of this frenetic burst of activity which covered just over half an hour.

After such a busy day we felt sure that Claire would roost in her box again.  Just to make sure we flicked the light on briefly at ten to eleven and sure enough - there she was tucked up inside.

She had certainly earned her rest tonight!