Birds to look for in February — Blue Tit

Photo credit: Paul Green

Where to look

They are mainly woodland birds but have spread out to live in many other places, including gardens.

Description

Blue tits (Cyanistes caeruleus) belong to a group of small birds called tits. There are six members of the group, which have plain or colourful feathers, stout legs and strong feet and short, triangular bills. Some species even have crests! Blue tit numbers have been increasing in the UK, possibly helped by people putting up nest boxes and feeding them. Males and females look quite similar except males’ colours are brighter. The way of telling them apart from other tits is through their colouring. They are the only British tit to have blue feathers. Their scientific name comes from the from the Greek word, ‘kuanos’ meaning dark blue. They eat insects, caterpillars, seeds and nuts.

Tweet of the Day

To hear the blue tit’s song follow the link to the BBC’s Tweet of the Day
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/b03mzv81

Spottings

Arabella

Harrison

Ethan

Satvik

class 4

Tamsin

Stanley

“The blue tit was pretty with a blue back. We saw it tweeting in a tree.”

Ilse

“We saw this one in Dudbridge”

Mrs Dalgleish-Smith

“Mrs Dalgleish-Smith spotted a blue tit as it landed on her office window”

Gavin

“Spotted on my bird feeder.”

ELLA

Tamsin B

Ilse

Where we've found Blue Tits

Blue Tit spottings journal (19 seen)

Last seen	Location	Spotted by	Group	Notes
29 Mar 2024			Stroud Valleys Project
28 Apr 2023			Stroud Valleys Project
15 Mar 2022			Stroud Valleys Project
14 Feb 2022	Stonehouse	Arabella	Foxmoor Primary
14 Feb 2022	Coombe Hill	Harrison	Foxmoor Primary
14 Feb 2022	The Bassets	Ethan	Foxmoor Primary
14 Feb 2022	Stratford park	Satvik	Foxmoor Primary
10 Feb 2022	birch trees school field	class 4	Foxmoor Primary
9 Feb 2021	Stroud	Tamsin	Stroud Valleys Project
3 Feb 2021	Daisy Bank	Stanley	Brimacombes	The blue tit was pretty with a blue back. We saw it tweeting in a tree.
19 Dec 2020	Dudbridge	Ilse	Leafgatherers	We saw this one in Dudbridge
12 May 2020	My garden	Mrs Dalgleish-Smith	Ireland Class	Mrs Dalgleish-Smith spotted a blue tit as it landed on her office window
7 Apr 2020	Garden	Jo	The Weaver's
31 Mar 2020	New Polzeath	Gavin	Blended	Spotted on my bird feeder.
27 Mar 2020	garden	ELLA	The Weaver's
25 Mar 2020		Tamsin B	Stroud Valleys Project
12 Mar 2020			Blended
6 Mar 2020	Lower Spillmans	Ilse	Leafgatherers
27 Feb 2020			Stroud Valley Community School

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