All for one ?

I have always enjoyed feeding birds.

Stuart will tell gleefully of how I was dubbed ‘Bird woman of Upper Norwood’ after my pigeon feeding exploits there. Nothing deterred by early morning inclement weather I would potter out to my tiny garden dressed in a voluminous blue dressing gown & Barbour wellies. Shortly thereafter the skies above SE19 would darken as 64,000 wood pigeons converged upon my bag of corn.

‘Come my pretties’

Who could have foreseen the council would take such a dim view ?

Anyhoo – the practice continues here in KT1. I don’t let a lack of garden lead to the spoilment of my enjoyment & cheerfully dangle assorted feeders from open window latches.

I have been rewarded with a constant stream of birds to the feeders, even robins, which aren’t supposed to like hanging from feeders. I’ve also seen chaffinches, greenfinches, coal tits & haw finches. By far the most numerous though are the blue tits.

I watched one today as I stared out of the window in the fashion of a dog waiting for it’s owner at the supermarket. I was astonished by what I saw. I can’t be sure if it was the same bird, but it always arrived at the feeder via the same route, over a particular garage roof & it’s behaviour got me to thinking.

Dainty, agile little birds, the blue tits have no problems hanging & selecting peanuts. The more cumbersome wood pigeons scavenge in John’s garden below, looking for bits the blue tits have dropped. (John is my very pleasant, perfectly amenable elderly neighbour whose only foible would appear to be the uncontrollable Tourette’s-type shouted rages he indulges in for no apparent reason – scares the hell out of me when I’m quietly blogging, I can tell you)

As I watched today’s bluey, I realised he was selecting peanuts as normal but rather than eat them there or fly away with them, he was dropping them to the ground where the fat, amiable woodies were enjoying them. He would drop about a dozen, then select one to eat.

I wondered at first if he was a fussy eater, simply rejecting sub-standard nuts. Upon closer inspection, the nuts he was dropping were perfect & identical to the ones he was eating.

It begs the question, can birds indulge in altruistic behaviour ? More
specifically – altruistic behaviour which benefits another species.

Discuss.


Michelle,

OK, I’m busted.

My name’s Carol, I’m 36 years old & I hate using the phone.

There I’ve said it.

Some people, like you & Bill are brilliant with the phone & enjoy using it, then there’s me, Eric & Murray.

Cx