Tui feeding on fruit.
-
- Posts: 25
- Joined: Mon Aug 19, 2013 7:48 pm
Tui feeding on fruit.
Hi all. Noticed a pair of tui feeding on rotting Mandarins in suburban Hamilton. Has anybody else seen this behaviour?
-
- Posts: 1313
- Joined: Tue Oct 18, 2011 10:05 am
Re: Tui feeding on fruit.
Yep! It’s pretty common I reckon. Bellbirds will do the same. From what I’ve seen they don’t break into the fruit themselves but they’ll quite happily mop up a kaka or a silver eyes leftovers.
- zarkov
- Posts: 653
- Joined: Sun Feb 14, 2010 3:54 pm
- Location: Torbay.
Re: Tui feeding on fruit.
I use slices of mandarin to attract Tuis to my nectar feeder when I put it out in the autumn.
I'm not sure whether they really like them, or just eat them to spite the Wax Eyes.
I'm not sure whether they really like them, or just eat them to spite the Wax Eyes.
- David Riddell
- Posts: 963
- Joined: Sat Jul 18, 2009 3:46 pm
Re: Tui feeding on fruit.
The tuis around our place are (so far) leaving our citrus alone, but they get stuck into the persimmons in a big way, as do the silvereyes. But then our mandarin and orange trees are quite small, and we tend to pick every available fruit and not leave anything lying around for the birds. There are usually some spare fruit under the grapefruit, which the silvereyes get into (also the possums, though I've caught five in the last couple of weeks and hopefully on top of them for now (EDIT: six as of this morning, this one right beside the grapefruit, so maybe not quite on top of them!)), but haven't so far seen any interest in them from the tuis.
Last edited by David Riddell on Sun Sep 09, 2018 9:03 am, edited 1 time in total.
- zarkov
- Posts: 653
- Joined: Sun Feb 14, 2010 3:54 pm
- Location: Torbay.
Re: Tui feeding on fruit.
My Tuis like their mandarins peeled.