“I spent 41 years making teapots for tea. The best one I ever made has never held a drop — just five sparrow eggs.” — Why a 73-year-old Stoke-on-Trent paintress is selling her last teapot nest boxes at a special price, before her painting hand stops for good.

The cold night a sparrow has nowhere to go

In January, a frosty night in Britain can last 16 hours. A house sparrow weighs about as much as ten teabags. It has to get through that night on what it ate the day before.

What saves it is a dry hole. A gap under the roof tiles. A crack in an old wall. A thick knot of ivy.

But those holes are disappearing. New roofs are sealed tight. Old walls are pointed and plastered. Ivy is pulled down because it looks untidy.

The result is easy to count. Britain has lost more than half of its house sparrows since the 1970s. The house sparrow is now on the UK’s Red List of birds of highest concern.

Why the next three months decide the spring

Most people think birds only need a box in spring. That is not true.

From October to March, small birds use nest boxes as bedrooms. Sparrows sleep in them. Wrens squeeze in together on the coldest nights — sometimes a dozen in one box, to share their warmth.

And a bird that finds a safe bed in winter often stays. When spring comes, it builds its nest in the same place.

One woman in Stoke-on-Trent understood this long before most. She learned it from a broken teapot.

The chipped teapot that started it all

Susan Bradshaw was 21 when she started work at a pottery in Burslem in 1974. She was a “paintress” — the name the Potteries gave to the women who painted teapots by hand.

For 41 years she painted around 60 teapots a day. Her special job was the thin gold line around the lid. One line, in one go, without lifting the brush.

“You don’t think about the line,” she says. “Your hand just does it.”

The pottery closed in 2015. A year later, Susan hung an old chipped teapot in her hedge, just for decoration. In April she looked inside. There were five small speckled eggs. A pair of house sparrows had moved in.

British birds have nested in old teapots, kettles and watering cans in hedges and sheds for generations. Susan did not invent the idea. She simply paid attention.

What makes Susan’s teapot different from a normal bird box

Her first teapot boxes were real china. Then came the “Beast from the East” in 2018. In one week of hard frost, four of her six china teapots split open.

“Water gets into the glaze, it freezes, and the pot cracks like an egg,” Susan says. “I wasn’t having that with a nest inside.” So she changed everything.

The robin who has never missed breakfast

Every morning at seven, Susan puts a few mealworms in the teacup on the first teapot she ever made. It still hangs on her fence.

The robin is always there first. It sits on the fence and waits for her.

“Sparrows upstairs, robin at the table,” she laughs. “Same as my mum’s house, really.”

The gold line her hand can no longer draw

For 41 years, Susan’s hand never shook. This spring, it started to.

Her doctor calls it a tremor. It gets worse each month. The flowers she can still manage. The gold line around the door, she cannot.

“And a teapot without the line isn’t one of mine,” she says quietly.

She is not upset when she says it. She says it the way you say the kettle has boiled. But she has made her decision. There are 86 finished teapots left in her shed. When they are gone, she will not paint any more.

Why Susan is not asking for what they are worth

Susan could charge much more. Each teapot takes her the best part of an evening to paint. Nobody would blame her.

But money was never the point. What she wants is simple: these last 86 teapots on fences and walls before the first hard frost. Dry beds for sparrows and wrens this winter. A breakfast table for a robin. And with luck, a nest in spring.

Her granddaughter Chloe set up a small online shop for her, after the neighbours kept knocking on Susan’s gate to ask for one. Susan still wraps every teapot herself.

What bird lovers say about Susan’s teapots

• ★★★★★

  “I put it on the fence in October. By November two sparrows were going in every evening at dusk. I watch them from the kitchen window with my tea. It never gets old.”

  Patricia M., Leek
• ★★★★★

  “Our robin found the cup the very first morning. Now he waits on the shed roof until I fill it. It is beautifully painted too, much nicer than the photos.”

  Graham T., Nantwich
• ★★★★★

  “Bought one for my mum, who cannot get out much any more. It hangs outside her window and she tells me every day which birds came. Best present I have given her in years.”

  Janet W., Macclesfield

Questions readers asked

Where can I buy Susan’s teapot nest box?

Only through this page. Susan’s teapots are not sold on Amazon, eBay or in garden centres.

How long will they be available?

Only while stocks last. There are 86 teapots left in Susan’s shed, and she will not paint any more. Once they are gone, they are gone.

What if I’m not happy with it?

You have 30 days to return it. Just send a short email and you get your money back. No risk, no fuss.

More readers, more teapots, more birds

• ★★★★★

  “A wren has been sleeping in ours since the first cold snap. You would never guess a bird that small could find it, but it did within a week.”

  David H., Stone
• ★★★★★

  “Easy to hang, two screws and done. It survived the storms in February without a scratch. The gold line around the door still shines.”

  Sandra K., Stafford
• ★★★★★

  “I have had cheap bird boxes before that sat empty for years. This one had sparrows nesting in it by April. I am ordering a second one for the front garden.”

  Michael R., Crewe