Saturday, February 11, 2012

Snowy decks and great tits

That title might boost this blog's traffic today. I hate to disappoint, but this great tit is a bird. The mésange (great tit) is one of the most common birds that we see around the house in winter. We put bird seed and suet balls out for them when it's very cold or snowy.

Can you see the tit on the left side of the suet hanger? Click to, um, er, make it bigger.

In addition to the great tits, we also see blue tits and crested tits, rouge gorges (European robins), pinsons (chaffinches), and merles (blackbirds) feeding on the deck and at the other feeders. Just the other day a great spotted woodpecker made a brief appearance on the deck. We see them all the time in the trees but rarely on the deck.

Also, since it's been so cold, there is the odd casualty or two. I found a dead grive musicienne (song thrush) out on the back path last week. It has since disappeared, likely picked up and carted off by a hungry animal.
at

11 comments:

  1. Lady Justine11 February, 2012 09:17

    The mayor of the next village up from us is called Monsieur Merle. I love that. Good luck with the ratings boost. Great tits is always funny to me, even if I am nearly 40. I'm glad to see other people find it amusing too! Surely, in this weather, they'd be blue tits though?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Susan11 February, 2012 09:28

    You'll get ridiculous numbers of hits like I do on my post called 'Big, Black and Beautiful' - which is about beetles :-)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Tim11 February, 2012 09:54

    Just to keep the tone low...
    I see big tits like fat balls!

    Being serious for a moment though [difficult for me, I know]... I am waiting to see my first Crested Tit in about forty years... we are pretty well wooded around here... they've got to be out there somewhere.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymous11 February, 2012 11:58

    I'm not saying a thing.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Ron11 February, 2012 12:43

    Walt,

    You know your audience well! Tits, man tits DO get my attention. One of my favorite subjects. I too like the "tit" birds. When we lived in Pennsylvania (with all the snow which we DON'T have here on the Delmarva peninsula where we live now), we had plenty of titmice birds. Alas, we have none here in the coastal flatlands. Instead we have sea gulls, Canadian snow geese (and the regular geese), vultures (human and avian) and house sparrows. Few few woodland birds as we have very little woodland. So the snow, ice and cold continue in Europe. Hold on, spring is coming!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Stephen11 February, 2012 14:18

    I have designed my garden to attract birds & the tits are so adorable because they arrive en masse & leave the same way. I tossed a big handful of thistle seeds yesterday & it was an avian Woodstock for part of the afternoon.

    ReplyDelete
  7. melinda11 February, 2012 15:27

    I'll see your great tits and raise you a pileated pecker

    ReplyDelete
  8. Seine Judeet (Judith)11 February, 2012 16:05

    Click to mésange-ify? (certainly better than to tittify might have been)

    Click to Dollly-Parton-ify?

    (Enjoyable photo, by the way!)

    ReplyDelete
  9. Archguy12 February, 2012 02:33

    Click to titillate?

    ReplyDelete
  10. Seine Judeet (Judith)12 February, 2012 06:13

    Oh, good one Archguy!

    ReplyDelete
  11. wcs12 February, 2012 07:30

    ladyjustine, lol! We do have blue tits at the feeder as well...

    susan, funny!

    tim, they're certainly not as plentiful as the greats and blues, but we started seeing them a couple of years ago.

    andrew, wise choice. ;)

    ron, I'm ready for spring now.

    stephen, do they arrive in pairs? :)

    melinda, I fold!

    judy, lol!

    archguy, I wish I had thought of that!

    ReplyDelete

Tell me what you think!