Crime Scene

I was sat in the garden this morning eating by bowl of supermarket-version-of-special-K, as per usual. Then a mound in my peripheral vision brought my attention to a disturbing sight: a bunch of fluffy grey, white and black feathers. I scrutinised them closely, looking for evidence of a struggle, an assassin (cat? owl?), but to no avail. There was no blood, but some of the feathers were bunched together, like they'd been pulled out in a handful. What upset me is that the flight feathers were clearly too small to have been from a dozey pigeon, and the only birds whose colours match the feathers are coal tit and great tit fledglings. The fledglings are admittedly pretty careless, and wouldn't have lasted very long in a more cat-prone area. But one casualty out of dozens isn't so bad.

Get me: bird detective.