"Martin" wrote

Malcolm Race wrote:

David wrote:
Noticed the other week that blue tits were stealing the ends of the
garden
twine used to tie up the olive trees to canes.

Today we realised that all the free ends had been gathered and they were
starting on the knots.

So we have tied some sacrificial bits of string near the important bits
in
the hope that they'll take those instead.

I can't remember string disappearing in previous years.

Nesting material.Over the last 2 or 3 years I have watched tits and
other small birds pulling fibres from my hanging basket liners.

Magpies do it to ours. We tried putting fibre out for them but they ignore
it.
Parakeets have stripped the leaves off the tops of our chestnut trees this
year.
In previous years they only ate the candles.

Our experience with Parakeets is that they always remove buds and leaves
from branches they use to perch on a regular basis. They did it to our old
Camellia tree which was near our sunflower heart feeder and have also done
it to a tall Birch 3 doors down which is the tree they use to check if our
garden is OK. It seems to be a trait, they obviously like a clear branch to
perch on.
--
Regards. Bob Hobden.
Posted to this Newsgroup from the W of London, UK