Although some of the larger-beaked tits can act as predators on medium sized seeds, many (all?) tit species in East and Southeast Asia also eat soft, small-seeded fruits, such as figs. I presume a small seed is safe if it is swallowed intact by a tit, but has anyone checked their feces for intact seeds?
Hello Richard. In the "Birds and berries" book Barbara and David Snow indicate the possibility of occasional seed dispersal by Tits. As far as I know, they indicate that Tits may disperse some seeds after removing fruit pulp and dropping the seed thereafter. I.e. it would be not endozoochory. Have a look on this article about possible endozoochory in tits: Fujita & Takahashi 2009. Ecological role of great tit Parus major as a seed disperser duriing winter. Ornithol. Sci. 8(2): 157-161. All the best ! Alexander
Thank you Alexander and Arvind. We have Parus major - although now called P. minor, I think - in southern China and it behaves just as these papers describe. Fujita and Takahashi's fecal analysis suggests endozoochory is probably more important than dropped larger seeds. There is quite a diversity of tits in northern tropical Asia - green-backed, yellow-cheeked, yellow-browed, sultan etc. - mostly with less robust beaks than Parus major/minor. Presumably these also disperses small swallowed seeds. Can anyone confirm this? Also, has anyone seen tits as a major consumer of tropical/subtropical fruits? I always see just one or, at most, two, along with other passerines, suggesting they are of little importance to the plant. Richard
Hi.
I have seen once African Blue Tits (Cyanistes teneriffae) feeding on fruits of a tree of the laurel forest of the Canary Islands, Laurus novocanariensis, but I don't know if the species can act as a seed disperser of this or other trees of such forest. In any case, when the seeds (of fleshy fruits) are big the dispersal by such a small tit can be very difficult, if not impossible...
Best regards.
Interesting! I think they probably just take pulp from big-seeded fruits. Fujita and Takahashi's fecal analysis for P. major in Japan suggests that they only swallow very small seeds.
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