Great Tits are the largest European tit and one of the most-studied wild bird populations in the world — a single Dutch population has been continuously studied since 1955.
They've shown rapid evolution in response to climate change, shifting their breeding date earlier by about 2 weeks over recent decades.
Adult diet is famously varied — they take everything from caterpillars to small bats and even peck open skulls of roosting bats in winter (rare but documented).
Great Tits are confident, vocal garden visitors. A standard 28–32mm-hole nest box and the usual feeders will pull them in.
Sunflower hearts, peanuts, suet, and mealworms. They'll dominate small feeders and chase off Blue Tits.
Mount a 28–32mm hole box 1.5–4 m up on a tree, fence post, or shed wall.
Mature trees within 30 m of the box. Native oak, beech, and hazel are best.
Shallow bath; regular bathers.
House Sparrows compete for the same hole size in some areas; a Sparrow-Resistant Plate or careful site selection helps.
Don't site the box in dense conifers; Great Tits prefer deciduous canopy.
A widespread Eurasian tit — common in gardens from the British Isles east to Japan.
Year-round resident throughout the British Isles, France, Iberia, Germany, Scandinavia (south).
Resident throughout the temperate zone east through Russia and into central Siberia.
Resident populations through China, Korea, and Japan (recent taxonomic revisions split off East Asian birds as a separate species).
Deciduous and mixed woodland, hedgerows, parks, and mature gardens. Adapts readily to suburban yards with a few mature trees.
Slightly larger entrance (32 mm) than Blue Tit; will evict Blue Tits from smaller boxes.