Very cheeky young Great Tit

A few weeks ago I was sitting in the garden early one evening with my husband drinking a glass of cider. Suddenly a young great tit landed on my glass and tried to have a drink!

He then stood on the table inches from me and proceeded to shout at me very loudly, He got on my lap and shoulder (shouting all the time) I got some bird seed and he happily ate it out of my hand.

He was there doing this for quite some time (15 mins or so) and seemed to quickly become attached to us. We went in the house for some food and came out half an hour later and he was there behaving the same - shouting again!

I have never ever seen a wild bird behave like this - I feed birds and get lots of tits in the garden, though they never let you get within 10 feet of them. Sadly we haven't seen him since. We get a few cats in our garden and perhaps his boldness got the better of him!

Any ideas anyone? Do you think he was perhaps hand reared by someone? Has anyone seen a great tit behave like this before?

Here is a video.



Has anyone seen anything like this before?

Cheers EGW

 

great footage EGW looks to me like hes been hand reared certainly a wild one wouldnt let you get that close

 

AMAZING.

 

That's lovely EGW - but as you say, probably hand reared and therefore too bold for his own good!

 

Glad you liked it guys - sorry the quality is so bad, it was taken on my mobile phone which we had to hand. It was such a treat to be visited by him. I like to think he is still around, to be honest the weather has been so bad we have barely sat in the garden since so he maybe is still about. I hope to see him again!

 

Lovely EG,

What a great experience for you :D

 

Hehe, thats ace!

 

Hope he,s ok...DEE

 

Very much doubt he was hand reared just out of the nest and hasn't learned the ways of the world, it happend to me once when some blue tits flew the nest one came and perched on my head I was looking around for small insects to feed him he was quite content for some minutes before joining his family,very difficult if not impossible to hand rear these small softbills.

 

When I was a little girl living in reasonably sized town (therefore unfriedly place for the birds), we found what a remember like a sparrow in the corner of the door leading to the stairs of the flat.
He probably got lost or something. We took him indoors, put him in a box, gave him some food (bread in milk, egg). In few words the little one survived and became our best friend, and a wonderful pet, throughout many years.
We would let him free to fly around from time to time and he would hop here and there but most of the time on our lap or shoulder, gently beaking our ears!!
We would take him at weekends in the countryhouse...
We lost him because of an accident which is too unpleasant to mention.
I think that the bird which came to you had some human contact before, because if a bird is able to escape, no matter how young it is, he never accepts willingly to be with somebody which picks him up.
Also it is very common that it just dies in the box if thats where you put him.
We were just so lucky with that little bird, and you with "yours" !!

 

That's a lovely story miraflores (aside from the tragic end). Walnut I think you are probably right. I got the impression he was a youngster who had just fledged and still expected someone to feed him, his constant chirping was like he was asking for food.

 

Great pictures EG.. The nearest thing to that I have seen were the Jackdaws taken from the nests and trained as pets and to talk,a practice carried out by the farm workers. Spiteful little critters too,often attacking folk, and there were at least four in our village flying around when I was a lad of 8.

 

Kept birds all my life hand reared most varieties sucessfully the small soft bills warblers tits etc are very difficult,fledglings which appears to be what you found Mira are relatively easy to bring on at this stage in their life and will latch on to you. I had a wild young pigeon that had fallen out of the nest I finished rearing it, in a morning it flew off for the day in an evening it would come back it did this for a few years, had a hand reared jackdaw and magpie Pal they were hillarious the magpie was an excellent talker the magpie would take a bath in a bowl of water in the garden walk into the house stretch his wings in front of the open fire and steam away until dry.

 

Reincarnation?

 

Well I guess it's a theory Elaine!

Perhaps that's why he wanted my cider- he was a drinker in a past life!