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The early spring activity of long-tailed tits is noticeable. They move around mostly in small groups: a pair of birds or a small group and even these are mostly adult birds, along with the chicks of last summer, sometimes a couple of families. We can meet them in mixed as well as deciduous forests and also in thickets, and they are most numerous in eastern Estonia. Long-tailed tits don’t stay particularly permanently in a place so that they might be watched at leisure but they are not shy of humans. They are friendly towards other birds joining their groups.

 

Long-tailed tits are lovable passerines, belonging not to tits (Parus) but to the long-tailed tit family (Aegithalidae). We first notice expressive dark starry eyes and a tiny beak in the white head. The neck and breast plumage are also brightly white, the flanks and belly gleam with a pinkish glow. The very long tail feathers are black with white margins. While the bird is up to 15 centimetres long, the length of the tail can be 9 centimetres and the weight is up to 10 grams.

 

At bird feeders, where they don’t stray often, they like to pick sunflower seeds from the snow. If however there is for instance a piece of lard hanging in the same spot then the attraction of a fat mouthful is evident at once.

 

In summer four to nine thousand long-tailed tit pairs breed in Estonia.

 

See long-tailed tit observations here  Elurikkus.ut.ee