There is something a little odd about Box2. So far we have only seen one bluetit at a time in that box and had assumed that it was the male that we had been missing. Now we are wondering if we have two females competing for the box.
This is clearly a female. Here she is bringing nesting material to the box for the first time.
Here a couple of hours later is some more.
A few minutes later, one bluetit is in the box when another comes to the nest box hole. This doesn't look like a welcoming male to me! The bird's posture looks more like a defensive one rather than an 'I'm keeping out of the way here' one.
The outside bird comes in regardless ...
... and the original occupant immediately goes.
Perhaps I was mistaken? Then this newcomer would be the female and the original occupant the male.
A few minutes later and the female is back with more nesting stuff. There can be no doubts here - this bird is female!
To make it even clearer, this is the first recorded nesting wriggle in this box.
Half an hour later she (or another female?) is back with quite a large wodge of moss.
She appears to be having a spot of bother ...
... getting it into the box!
Time to rethink perhaps!
Well, she's finally succeeded ...
... though she's left quite a lot of moss still stuck in the hole.
She has a celebratory nesting wriggle ...
... and leaves ...
... managing to squeeze past the moss in the hole without displacing it.