Behind the mill is a flowering dogwood, which I can see out of our back window. At all seasons of the year this small tree is a delight: it looks especially gorgeous in the summer, with its bracts of pinkish-white, and is one of the last trees in the garden to lose its leaves. When the last leaves have fallen, I hang feeders from its bare branches and, in the winter months, the dogwood tree plays host to all my garden bird friends.
As well as the garden’s resident robins, dunnocks, sparrows, and chaffinches all like to hang out in this tree.
and a filled coconut half will bring a flock of them!
But at this time of year, it’s the tits that enjoy the dogwood tree most of all.
The great tits are handsome . . .
. . .bold . . .
. . . and striking.
The blue tits are winsome . . .
. . .nimble . . .
. . . and cheeky.
But the coal tits are my secret favourite of all the birds in the dogwood tree.
Any garden bird reference tome will tell you that these are low-ranking birds: tolerated by the other tits, with whom they hang about in winter flocks, but always last in line when there’s a tasty treat to be had.
Perhaps I like the coal tits because they tolerate my presence and are generally a little more confiding, in the manner of my friendly garden robins. Perhaps I admire their superior acrobatic skill, as they deftly attach their diminutive, darting bodies to the most unlikely of surfaces.
Or perhaps it is their appealing palette whose wintery neutrals and barely-there peachy-buff speaks so precisely to December’s dominant tones . . .
. . .that makes the coal tit top of my winter garden pecking order.
Which birds are you enjoying in your garden this winter?
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At one end of the size spectrum are the ravens, many in mating pairs at this time of year. Intelligent, handsome, and comical all at once. Always talking to one another, squawking yes, but the best is that unique guttural sound they make in their throats, impossible to imitate by this human anyway. So fascinating.
At the other end, is our year round neighbor, the hummingbird, some a bit larger some tinier and more delicate, but always so energetic, aggressively territorial and a blur in flight.
We put out ‘fat’ bags, the butcher makes them up from fat trimmed of his cuts of meat and wraps them in twine and we hang them on the bare apple trees throughout winter.
Dear Kate, We too have lovely blue tits, great tits and long-tailed tits. I haven’t seen the coal tits this year, but previous years we have been lucky to see them here. We also enjoy the gold finches who enjoy our sunflower hearts. A couple of weeks ago we were also lucky to see the gold crest. I have just come in from the garden, and have enjoyed watching the little owl on my neighbours chimney. We also enjoy our male & female blackbirds who have been enjoying our crab apples and cotoneaster berries. I have to be very careful to collect all the bits they leave behind, as my young Labrador eats what they leave behind and it makes him very windy!! Wishing you many blessings through this winter season and peace and joy throughout the new year. I’m pleased my daughter signed me up to your emails and I love all that you send to me. Thank You.
Thank you for sharing your winter garden with us, Kate! I am hoping for snow in Colorado, although right now we are in the midst of a disturbing heat wave. Nevertheless, it is the dark and cozy time of the year and I love that!!
Dear Kate,
What lovely pictures. My favourite garden birds are robins, blackbirds and long tailed tits. I used to work at a sand quarry and great family groups go long tailed tits would come to my bird feeders or you would hear them in the silver birch trees.
Hope you have a lovely Christmas and Bob doesn’t try to steal Christmas dinner!
very beautifull bird👍
Thank you. I loved all those bird photos. They gave me a lift.
Lovely pics. We have squirrels around here too in Sussex, so I have to replace the coarse string that comes with the half-coconuts with wire. Otherwise, the squirrels simply bite straight through the string and carry off the entire half-coconut. And then the wire has to be long and thin, so that when the magpies dive for the coconut it swings about so wildly they fall off. Only the tits are light enough to land and not swing too wildly. And the robins, though they have to work harder. Bluetits here, and great tits; no coaltits. Occasionally, a mob of long-tailed tits, who are just irresistibly scruffy and gorgeous.
I love to read everyone’s comments! Here in Auckland, New Zealand it’s summer (although looking at the rain outside on Christmas Eve, it’s hard to believe!), and we have lots of birds in the garden. I don’t put our bird food as we have a cat – but our berry garden is in full fruit, and making sure the netting is gap-free is nearly a full-time occupation!
Our resident blackbirds sit on the arbour, eyeing up the boysenberries ripening below, longing to have a quick peck at the berries – but they never eat the whole of a berry, just one peck and onto the next, spoiling more fruit. The supporting chorus of thrushes follow in their birdsteps, but the sparrows aren’t interested and plunder any grass seed heads we’ve missed. Ditto the mynahs – they leave our garden alone and perch on neighbouring houses’ aerials, yelling abuse at all birdkind.
The birds I wish would stop in our garden and take the weight off their wings are the eastern rosellas, self-imports flown over from Australia. We hear them as they fly through, their distinctive parrotty song continuing as a seeming conversation on the wing. If we’re lucky, we see a brilliant flash of red and green, so different from our native new Zealand birds – and then it’s over until another fly-by, seemingly at the speed of sound!
Have a wonderful Christmas!
What a lovely garden to enjoy all those gorgeous birds – Winter as lovely a season as any !
Merry Christmas
Good Health & Happiness in 2026
from Diane
New Zealand
Birds are so lovely to watch in winter! I’m in Colorado. I have ground feeders outside the kitchen door because I put shelled sunflower seeds there – black capped chickadees, juncos, house finches with rosy breasts, good finches barely showing yellow this time of year, occasionally tiny tits, blue jays, American robins, a pair of mourning doves, hairy and downy woodpeckers. Thawed water in a birdbath helps bring the larger birds, as does a suet block and vertical sunflower seeds feeders. 😊 Thanks for the photos!
Hi!
I always find your posts enjoyable. Thank you for writing.
At the moment I enjoy watching blue jays, they remind me of 12 to 14 year old boys on the playground or basketball courts. I am also enjoying the chickadees, woodpeckers and cardinals. Oh! And the mourning doves with their warbling coos and quiet nature. Last week it snowed and when the mourning doves left their perches in the trees to gather breakfast they left behind these cute little “u” shaped spaces on the snow lined branches. Then there are the nuthatches, titmouse, song sparrows, etc. I guess I should have just said I am enjoying all the birds!
Happy holidays!
Lynn
Lovely birds! In the Chicago area, we currently are seeing woodpeckers, house sparrows, cardinals, mourning doves, both white and red-breasted nuthatches (adorable!), various finches, and hawks (sometimes Cooper’s, sometimes red-tailed). I also have heard a pair of great-horned owls recently in the middle of the night. Do you have the Merlin app? It s great fun to find out what birds are nearby.
Thanks for a delightful read Kate. I’m in sun tropical Australia for me it’s Magpies Butcherbirds Plovers and Noisy Minors. As I live on a lake we have the water birds Pelicans Egrets and black Swans.
Merry Christmas to you and yours.
Renee 🎄
We had a visit a few days ago from a flock of long tailed tits, one of my favourite birds. They darted and flittered about our haxel tree for over ten minutes. My grandmother, who delighted in quirky names for birds and flowers, called them Poke Puddings, a name local to where she lived and probably referring to their long tails poking out of their amazingly clever nests.
My new favourite is the bullfinch. We have three handsome boys visiting regularly (after none for years). What lovely birds. Their colouring is so striking. The nuthatch is back too and a few green finches as well as coal, great and blue tits and robins, as well as a starling. Such entertainment, I’ve cut down loads of plants so we can see them better. Happy Christmas to you, Tom and all at KDD. Find joy and peace in the days ahead. Rhona x
Bluejays, goldfinches, nuthatches, boreal chickadees, crows, evening grosbeak, eastern flickers, downy woodpeckers. I live on Prince Edward Island Canada. Love your photos! There is a lovely song called the “Littlest Birds (Have the Prettiest Songs)” I thought you might enjoy it: https://youtu.be/M-Fk_42ZTtE?si=SKtSfjUfdS96tknx
With kindness
Rachael
In South East Michigan we get flocks of Junco’s who migrate here from Northern Canada for Winter, they’re ground feeders, gobbling up the seeds the other birds drop from the feeder. There’s lots of Sparrows of course and the small, Coal Tit like Chickadee’s that live here year round. Lately we’ve had a Red Bellied Woodpecker at the feeder, the small birds scatter when it lands! He takes individual seeds, finds a nice bit of loose bark in the pine tree near the kitchen window then hammers them in for winter food. Of course the squirrels think this is a fabulous idea and like to raid his stash when he leaves! Two other birds spotted this week were a Nuthatch, both the red breasted and the white breasted ones, and a Tufted Titmouse. Also the male and female Cardinal birds are year round visitors too.
Thank you, Kate, for your wonderful writings. I have enjoyed your blog and your emails over the years. We do not have those pretty tits here in the Willamette Valley of Oregon. The only tit in our region is the bushtit, a plain gray bird that forages in flocks. They appear at our suet feeders in groups of at least 20 and hardly stay still, rushing in for a quick bite then leaving. It\’s the large number of them that is so remarkable. My book says: \”Groups of up to fifty individuals move from tree to tree in a tight line, almost single file.\” This time of year my favorite birds at our feeders are the red finches and the chickadees. Also, the nuthatch. If we\’re really lucky, the cedar waxwing come to our Beautybush. I\’m enjoying knitting the Tonnach cardigan right now. Have a lovely holiday season! Warmly, Kathy (aka Northwest Knitting)
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Hello Kate Just to say how much I enjoyed seeing all your wee birds. Do you have any Long Tailed Tits, they are just gorgeous and I have at least 11 which come to one of my feeders. I watch them from my kitchen window, Perhaps I shouldn\’t write but just wanted to say your post is lovely. Thank yu. Wishing you a very Happy Christmas. Best Wishes Isa
I make my own suet feeders in coffee cups – the ultimate in reusable bird feeders! We have two feeding stations, obe by our house and one at the edge of our woodlot. We have great tits and bluetits, house sparrows and tree sparrows, and greenfinches galore. Right now we’re getting bulfinches too, and a greater spotted woodpecker. So far we’ve had 19 species since 1st October, not bad for southern Norway.
My favourite of the tits that visit my garden are the long-tailed tits. They are tiny apart from their tail. They always come as a group, swarm the feeders for a few minutes and then depart all together. Always keeping on the move, flitting from tree to tree.
I remember being taught by a bird watcher that the coal tits are the bravest as they will be the first to come back to the feeders after the whole lot get spooked by something and flee.