It’s quite enjoyable watching the antics of the various visitors to our bird feeders, and trying to work out the pecking order. Larger birds take precedence, by and large, and obviously the sudden arrival of a magpie or even a wood pigeon will send everything else scattering, until they realise it’s not a sparrow hawk or anything else too threatening. Even magpies can only peck around underneath our feeders, though I have on occasions had jackdaws using them - in a rather ungainly way, but they manage it. The great spotted woodpecker is the largest bird that regularly uses our feeders, and no-one argues with her.
Of the smaller birds, the one at the top of the pecking order is clearly the nuthatch. Even the greenfinches give way, and they’re usually the big boys. Of the finches, chaffinches come bottom of the pecking order, partly because they are clumsier than most others; siskins are much smaller, but they are so acrobatic they can out-manoeuvre a chaffinch any time.
We had a blackcap that was very combative a couple of winters ago, but this year’s birds are content just to muck along with the other birds. Coal tits are definitely at the bottom of the pile, and don’t even try to compete, just making a quick dash to the feeder and back when opportunity arises, though they’ll stay longer if no other birds are around. They will take seeds and secrete them for later use, which is a good strategy if you’re where they are in the pecking order. They are also probably the main reason why sunflowers keep coming up in our hanging baskets!
Robins are always combative, feisty little birds, though some throw their weight around more than others. We have one currently that will perch on top of the feeders and face up to anything else that comes along. But he’s not so good at actually using the feeder, so once a mob of, say, greenfinches comes along he has to retire. Anyway, robins save most of their aggression for other robins, in winter holding solo territories (two overlap in our garden, which makes for some great robin fights). By this time they’ve paired up, so we now have two regulars who seem to be getting on all right - plus an interloper who stirs things up from time to time.
I’ve noticed, though, that at least one of our robins will fly the width of our garden to attack and see off a dunnock (or hedgesparrow). Postings on the net suggest that lots of other people have observed this antipathy between robins and dunnocks, but not much has been posted by way of explanation. Our garden can be full of other birds, but the robin will ignore them to focus on the dunnocks. They are of course a similar size and shape, so it may be that the robin is motivated by that - though of course dunnocks don’t have the red breast which is what stirs up robin on robin fights. Both species are mostly ground feeders, so I suppose there is a direct competition between them for food. Our local dunnocks always give in to robin attacks, but come straight back as soon as their attacker’s back is turned!
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