Biodiversity Group: The Great Tit and Wytham Woods

The great tit is the largest British tit. It has a yellow breast, long black central band running from its chin to its tail, has a black and white head and blue grey tail feathers with white outer ones. The longest running study of great tits has been taking place in Wytham Woods an ancient woodland just outside Oxford which is owned by Oxford University. The study started in 1947 when a student in the Department of Zoology erected 100 nest boxes and a garden shed in which he spent the next 3 summers. There are now over 1,000 nest boxes with every parent and fledgling using them being given a numbered ring and a tiny radio tag enabling researchers to study such things as their behaviour, relationships, whether characteristics are inherited and reaction to climate change. Some of the conclusions they have come to so far are: shyer birds tend to stay with the same flock of birds whereas the bolder ones are more gregarious foraging with several different flocks, males prefer to associate with birds of a similar personality (the shyer birds avoiding the bolder ones), blue tits are very good at learning new behaviour from others. They are also finding that in response to climate change birds are laying their eggs about 3 weeks earlier than in 1960 thus taking advantage of the earlier emergence of the winter moth larvae which makes up 90% of the diet for their young.

Did You Know?

Great tits are very aggressive and can actually kill other birds. Their beak is a good weapon – it must be as it can open a hazel-nut.
10,000 caterpillars are needed to feed the 9 – 11 great tit chicks from hatching to fledging.
To help her decide when to lay her eggs it is thought the female uses temperature, length of day and possibly the emergence of the tree leaf buds as she has been seen closely inspecting them and even tasting them.

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