Watching TV helps birds make better food choices

By watching videos of each other eating, blue tits and great tits can learn to avoid foods that taste disgusting and are potentially toxic, a new study has found. Seeing the 'disgust response' in others helps them recognise ...

Small birds' vision: Not so sharp but superfast

One may expect a creature that darts around its habitat to be capable of perceiving rapid changes as well. Yet birds are famed more for their good visual acuity. Joint research by Uppsala University, Stockholm University ...

Housing shortage alters reproductive behaviour in blue tits

(PhysOrg.com) -- Increased competition for rare breeding sites causes female blue tits to invest more time in their current brood, to spend more time feeding their offspring and also to produce more male offspring in their ...

Social networks reveal dating in blue tits

Winter associations predict social and extra-pair mating patterns in blue tits. Researchers of the Max Planck Institutes for Ornithology in Seewiesen and for Animal Behavior in Radolfzell show in their new study that blue ...

Blue tits provide insight into climate change

(Phys.org) —Researchers believe that the size of birds' nests created in response to changing weather patterns may be partly to blame for reproductive failures over the last two years.

Bright birds make good mothers

Female blue tits with brightly coloured crowns are better mothers than duller birds, according to a new study led by the University of York.

Caterpillars key to urban blue tits' low breeding

Many animal species suffer reduced reproductive success in urban habitats, despite wide-spread supplementation of breeding and feeding opportunities. In some years, the breeding success of city birds is devastatingly low.

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