A HOUSEBOUND Hampshire pensioner who loves nothing better than watching the birds from her window is at the end of her tether - due to a barmy blue tit.
Gwendoline Baylis, 81, from Southampton, has been driven out of her lounge by the nutty bird, which has tapped at her window from 6.30am until dusk for the past six weeks.
Even after tapping back at the bird with a fly swat and hanging net curtains and plastic bags outside the window, her feathered friend refuses to stop pestering her.
"I love birds and feed them all but this one is driving me crazy," said Gwendoline, of Northfield Road, Bitterne Park.
"It tap tap taps at the window all the time, only stopping for a few minutes for food and then starts again.
"I cannot even have my afternoon nap on the settee anymore and have to go to the bedroom to sleep."
Suffering from a variety of health problems including arthritis, cancer and diabetes, Gwendoline was nicknamed a "tough old bird" herself by a doctor after her last stay in hospital.
After reading about another reader in the Daily Echo who was plagued by a blackbird attacking their car, Gwendoline felt compelled to write in herself.
"I only get out once a week when my friend takes me shopping so I have set up three bird tables, two bird baths and two nest boxes in my garden so I can sit and look at all the different birds from the big picture window in my lounge.
"Birds are so interesting to watch and they get up to all sorts of tricks in my garden but I don't know what this blue tit wants.
"The postman, the milkman, my cleaner and my daughter and her friend have all seen it and they say it's nuts and wants to knock itself out.
"I have lots of other windows in the sun lounge but he doesn't go near them. It's the big window he likes.
"I have hung net curtains on the outside and plastic bags but it got underneath and still taps.
"I have sat in my armchair by the window with a fly swat and when he taps, I tap back but he still doesn't go away."
Gwendoline has overcome other garden pests before - she once set up a hosepipe to squirt a squirrel when he tried to steal nuts from her bird tables - but she doesn't know what to do this time.
"I have never had one like this before and would welcome any suggestions."
Gwendoline's daughter, Sally Jane, 48, has seen the funny side and drawn cartoons to depict her mother's battle against the blue tit.
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