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Titmices
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Description: The Tufted Titmouse is an active, noisy,
and conspicuously vocal bird whose typical song is a
loud whistled peter peter peter. Both sexes have a distinctive
black forehead and gray crest. The upperparts are gray,
with slightly darker gray flight feathers. The lores
are pale buff. The face and underparts are white with
rufous flanks. The dark eye and eye ring are prominent
on the white face.
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The Tufted Titmouse's range throughtout the eastern
United States has grown steadily northward during this
century. This expansion may be linked to the growing
number of people feeding birds each year
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Small, active and acrobatic are all apt descriptions of the Tufted
Titmouse. These tiny birds are friendly and fun to watch as they search
for insects under the fallen leaves, along the trunks of trees and
well as in the tree tops. The bird family of Titmice (Paridae) includes
65 species, 12 of which reside in North America. Along with the Tufted
Titmouse, the chickadees, Plain Titmouse, Bridled Titmouse, Oak Titmouse
and the Juniper Titmouse can be found in the U.S. The birds in the
titmouse family are sparrow-sized, with a gray color, lighter undersides,perky
tufted heads and large inquisitive bright dark eyes. Their beaks are
short cone-shaped beak. Male and female titmice look alike. Tufted
Titmice are the normal gray color with their lower parts light gray
and their flanks will be a rusty orange color. They have a black forehead
while the area around the eyes is light gray. And although the Tufted
Titmouse is the largest titmouse, it is only 6.5 inches long, has
a wingspan of 10.75 inches and weighs a mere 0.8 ounce!
The Tufted Titmouse can be found over nearly the entire eastern half
of the US during both the summer and winter. These non-migratory birds
can be found in deciduous and mixed deciduous-coniferous forests,
preferably near swamps and riversides. The Tufted Titmouse, sometimes
called a Sugar Bird, or Tomtit, is active and agile, hanging upside
down from small branches to feed on insects. They are sociable birds
and can be seen in mixed flocks with chickadees and nuthatches. Not
sure if that quick moving bird high in the branches is a Tufted Titmouse?
Listen to its song. Its song is a loud clear whistle: "Peter,
Peter, Peter". Tufted Titmice are usually eat insects and spiders
by clinging to trunks of trees and branches, but in winter when not
many insects are available, these titmice vary their diet with berries,
nuts and seeds. Fill your hopper feeders with shelled peanuts or black
oil sunflower feed to bring them closer to your windows. Watch them
closely and you might spy them using their beak to pound open the
shell while holding the seed with its feet. You can also try putting
out grapes or apple chunks on a platform feeder. Peanut butter suet
is extremely tempting to them so fill up a suet feeder with it or
even smear it on a tree trunk where they'll discover the treat while
climbing all over the trunk. If you can add a few trees or bushes
to your yard, you'll make it more attractive to these birds. Try planting
evergreens, oaks, bayberry, mulberry, crabapples, blueberries blackberries,
grapes, serviceberries or even lots of sunny sunflowers. These small
birds are cavity-dwellers, nesting in the wild in old woodpecker holes
or tree cavities. In your yard, put up nesting boxes mounted about
5-10 foot off the ground in an area with trees. Make sure they see
your birdhouse by placing some nesting material stuffed into a suet
holder and hang it near the house from March to July when they are
busy breeding. |
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| Bird rescue & bird adoption;
parrot refuge/rescue & placement for unwanted birds. |
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| Check out our list of local
birds broken down by your state and different types of
species. |
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| Migrating birds stay on track
because of chemical reactions in their bodies that are
influenced by the Earth's magnetic field... |
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Part
I
November
19, 2004