Just in case any of you were feeling a little bit hungry.
I thought I'd give you a wee sample of what some birds eat over the course of an average day.
First up on the menu, some delicious nuts, followed by some wild insects - any insects they can find.
We only have woodlice here, but flies, spiders - whatever they get their beaks on.
Then we'd follow that up with some delicious worms.
There they are.
That will go lovely with a little bit of tomato sauce!
And then you'd follow that up with some slugs, on a cool bed of lettuce and some sunflower seeds on the side.
And then, on the kids' menu today, for the junior members of the family, mealworms.
These go down a treat and they're very rich in protein - 50% protein, that is.
And then for desert, you'd follow that up with some fruit.
Obviously not just lovely, delicious berries that they find, but also any old fruit that they find in the bin - particularly brown, squashed-up bananas.
So I bet your mum's Brussels sprouts don't seem so bad now, do they?
Video summary
A look at the different foods eaten by urban birds. Nuts, insects, worms, slugs, mealworms and fruit all contribute to their diet.
This short film comes from the BBC series, See You See Me.
Teacher Notes
- The clip could provide a starting point for children to look at local birds and begin to recognise and identify them.
- Children could look at the diets of the birds and start to classify birds as carnivores, herbivores or omnivores.
- Alternatively children could set up a class bird table and keep a tally of all the different birds they can see visiting it throughout a set period of a week or two weeks and use this data to create simple bar charts, which would link with mathematics objectives.
This short film is relevant for teaching Science at KS1 in England and Wales, Foundation and KS1 in Northern Ireland and Early level and first level in Scotland.
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