The story of NB023 and NB042

It is late in the afternoon. The sun has been up for several hours. Two buzzards are circling around each other, vocalizing like two female tennis players on Wimbledon. Attached to a tree, a tree like most other trees, not very well hidden from the eye, is nest-box 23. A nest box very close to nest-box 42 (why this is completely irrelevant I will explain later). Nest-box 23 was, until a week ago, still empty. But not anymore. Next to some moss and feathers, now lies the evidence of a crime. A murder has been committed..  

There lay a little blue tit, still good in her feathers, rigor mortis has not taken her yet. The evidence of the crime is clearly visible on the back of the head. Where some pretty little violet feathers used to be, it was now bold and a bit bloody. Despite this little grim some detail, the bird looks like it is sleeping in the corner. I take her out of the box and give her a place between the leaves on the ground. While doing this I know the murderer is close, maybe even looking. I was warned that this would happen. Still seeing it is, and will always be, a little bit sad.

So, who did it? Who is this cold blooded killer? It was a great tit. Yes, that cute little yellow-black bird, that you mostly see dangling on a bag of peanuts. That’s the one. Why? Competition reduction by means of instinct? Somehow great tits feel the unstoppable need to kill the small birds that they find accidentally in their nest-box. A clear case of wrong place, wrong time. I have read in a book about great tit ecology that great tits sharpen their beaks on a twig. One of the ideas is, that this might make their beaks better fit to eat insects instead of the seeds they have been eating in winter. Well, now I have an additional theory. Nothing seems innocent in nature..

Then there is nest-box 42, the nest-box close to 23. Box 42 has a very active singing owner. During the rounds we make to measure singing activity, this little guy is rarely absent. One early rainy morning I heard him song matching. Great tits only have a few song types and they usually share some of them with their neighbours. In this way they can direct their singing to a specific neighbour (or so is the idea). Bird 42 was happily singing his song, when a neighbouring bird very loudly interrupted him with another song. Bird 42 is not of the type that lets other birds walk over him and so replied immediately with the same song. That neighbour will think twice before invading his territory!

There are more than 200 nest-boxes in my study area, but some just stick with you. Imagine my excitement when I learned that 42’s female had layed her first egg. How will this family develop? Will he be a successful parent? How many of his young will fledge? The disappointment was big when the day after, the female was found dead on the nest. Maybe an egg got stuck? We can only guess. The nest-box was cleaned and 42 was left with an empty box and without a mate. However, such an handsome singer must have the ladies for the picking. And to our surprise, within 3 days the nest-box was full with nesting material again. And today, barely a week later, there was.. an egg! That was quick.

The lesson from all of this?
Lead singers get all the girls!

But also, behind every nest-box there is a story. We only see fractions of what is really going on around us. Luckily there are webcams. At www.beleefdelente.nl you can look at the birds in the boxes 24/7. Of course Vogelbescherming Nederland has only great tit box in the Netherlands not having anything going on (that box used to be in my Dad’s backyard). However, I am sure this will change, and in the mean time there are 10 other bird species to spy on.
No need for television if you can watch life itself!

Cheers

Stalker

So who was studying who again?