Titmice
The titmouse is one of perhaps 60 species worldwide in the family Paridae, others of which include the closely related chickadee varieties of North America.
Most people who feed birds east of the Great Plains are familiar only with the tufted titmouse. Since 1983 it has been lumped with the black-crested titmouse of the southwest.
Three other varieties found in the western U.S. include the oak, juniper and bridled species, all of which also used to be just plain titmice. Tufted titmice are among the most common and familiar songbirds of the eastern deciduous forest, especially oak woods. Their year-round range lies generally east of a line drawn from around El Paso, Texas northeast to about Duluth, Minnesota, including southern Ontario and eastern Mexico. They have been expanding their range northward since the 1950s thanks to three factors: mild winters, the recovery of abandoned farms to forest habitat, and the popularity of bird feeding.
A little more than six inches long, the tufted titmouse is easily identified. Male and female look alike, gray above, lighter below with rusty/russet/ buff flanks. A black bill and forehead set off the gray crest. But the real give-away of a titmouse's presence is the big black eye, made larger by the black ring surrounding it.
At backyard feeders, titmice favor sunflower seeds, nuts, suet and live food such as mealworms. Like chickadees, titmice love black oil sunflower seeds, similarly holding them between their feet and pounding them open with their bills. Two-thirds of their diet comes from the wild: seeds, mast, invertebrates, caterpillars, beetles, ants, bees, wasps, flies, insect egg cases and spiders. On the job full-time, titmice rank with the best of man's allies in insect pest control.
During the fall and winter, they cache food for later use, typically taking only one seed per trip. Usually they shell the seeds before caching them under slabs of loose bark or in furrows of rough bark.
Paired year-round, titmice nearly always nest in cavities, whether natural, old woodpecker holes or nest boxes. The female takes about four days to build a nest, by the end of April in most areas, then lays from three to nine white, speckled eggs. The male feeds her during the two-week incubation period. Nestlings (below) fledge in 21/2 weeks.
Tufted titmice do not migrate, and they can be heard singing even on the coldest winter days. Their song is a loud, pure, one or two note whistle: "Peter! Peter! Peter!" or "Here! Here! Here!" Among the extensive repertoire of call notes, the most familiar is not unlike a chickadee's.
Oak titmice, the western-most variety, are named for their habitat preference -- primarily oak and pine woods in California. They are crested, uniformly gray, a shade lighter below, and lack the tufted titmouse's russet flank. Juniper titmice look like oak titmice. But they cover a much broader range across the intermountain regions of Nevada, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona. They prefer pi–yon pine nuts to acorns.
Bridled titmice are the smallest of the species. They live only in the oak and pinewoods of SE Arizona, SW New Mexico and into the mountains of the Mexican plateau. The facial pattern is striking: black crest and throat and white head marked on the side by a v-shaped bridle pattern. They favor acorns.
Spotted Towhee
Where They Live: Like their cousins the Eastern towhee, spotted towhees prefer wooded undergrowth along streams, roadsides, chaparral and woodland thickets. They make their homes throughout the western half of the United States from the northern border south into Mexico. Spotted or Eastern, towhees are members of the sparrow family and share some of the same traits and habits. Like many sparrows, towhees usually build their nests close to the ground, frequently making them victims of cowbirds' bad habit of leaving their eggs in other birds' nests.
What They Eat: Spotted towhees noisily hop-and-scratch to uncover their preferred food from the under story ground: beetles, snails, small amphibians and various wild berries. You can entice towhees to your backyard using a ground feeder stocked with millet and sunflower seeds.
Appearance: Spotted towhees are slightly smaller and more slender than American robins, and their rusty flanks are a similar color to the robin's red breast. Couple this similarity in size and color with the spotted towhee's preference for ground foraging and you can understand why one of its colloquial names is "ground robin." Spotted towhees have white corners on their dark tails. This handsome contrast is frequently used during breeding season to impress the "ladies." Males display for the females by spreading and folding their tail feathers. The coloration of spotted towhees resembles Eastern towhees except the birds of the West have more white spotting on the back and the females generally are darker. White wing bars also distinguish them. So similar are these two birds that at one time they all were considered rufous-sided towhees.
Voice: The song of the spotted towhee is a high trill that sounds like the final phrase of the Eastern towhee's song, "Tee-ee-ee-ee." Their call is a bold and clear, "Shrenk."
Eastern Towhee
Where They Live: If you live in the East, those strikingly familiar-looking birds formerly called rufous-sided towhees now are known as Eastern towhees. They live and forage in brushy under story, which you might think would make them secretive and difficult to discover. The opposite is true. Towhees are distinctive and conspicuous in both song and appearance, making them excellent subjects for beginners to the activity of bird observation. Towhees range from Wisconsin east to southern Maine and south to Florida and the Gulf Coast. Birds in the northern edge of this expansive range move south for the winter. In all other regions, they are year-round residents. Try not to eliminate thickets or hedgerows if you are fortunate enough to have them as inhabitants of your landscape. Areas of brushy undercover or shrubby overgrown fields, as well as forest edges, are likely homes for the Eastern towhee.
What They Eat: Eastern towhees prefer all manner of insects, spiders, seeds and wild berries. What makes them easy to find in their normally tangled environment is their manner of eating. Towhees use their toes as a leaf rake. They hop up, raking both feet backward. With leaves and debris raked from the ground, they search for tasty morsels. If you walk quietly along a brushy forest edge, you may hear the rustle of leaves as a nearby towhee hunts for food. Towhees also visit backyards for a seed treat. A ground-level platform feeder stocked with white proso millet seed and cracked corn is an appealing offering to this bird.
Appearance: Male and female towhees have dark plumage on their heads and backs that contrasts with white bellies and rusty-orange flanks. In the case of males, the head, neck, throat and back are black. Females are dark brown where the males are black. Towhees have long rounded tails and noticeable red eyes (except for one sub-species found in Florida that has white eyes).
Voice: Eastern towhees have easily recognizable songs and calls. The call note signals alarm and serves as a means for individual birds to stay in contact. It is a loud, sudden vocalization, one syllable with two slurred pitches and an upward inflection that makes it sound like the towhee is calling its name, "toe-eeeeee." Some more poetic people are sure the call from the underbrush is a loud, "Louise." The song of the Eastern towhee is equally delightful, composed of two whistled notes followed by a trill. Each of the three parts of the song is sung on a different pitch. The pneumonic for the song goes, "Drink your teeeeeeeeee." Males often perch on a shrub or mid-tree branch and offer this unique song repeatedly.
Tree Swallow
Where They Live: Locate an open, grassy area with nearby water, gaze up in a warm summer sky, and you are likely to observe the amazing flying skills of one of our most popular aerialists. During spring and summer months, tree swallows can be found throughout the middle and northern latitudes of North America and Canada.
Tree swallows use natural tree cavities and artificial nest boxes to accommodate their feather-lined, grass nests. After the young have fledged, tree swallows migrate to coastal areas, where they build their energy reserves by feeding on insects. With the first signs of autumn, they are off to wintering grounds along the southern coasts of the United States and Central America. Their preference for nest cavities located in open areas with scattered, low vegetation puts tree swallows in direct competition with eastern bluebirds for available nest sites.
Bluebird enthusiasts utilize two strategies to deal with this situation. One involves placing two nest boxes back-to-back on the same post. Either specie will defend the adjacent box against another pair of its own kind, but will accept the other specie as such close neighbors. The other option is to understand that tree swallows only raise one family each year, while bluebirds raise two or three families per season. A box initially claimed by tree swallows can be cleared of the nest as soon as the swallow chicks have fledged, making it available for a bluebird pair's second brood.
What They Eat: Don't expect tree swallows to visit backyard feeders. As the earliest migrating swallow, they can rely on berries and some seeds if insects are scarce. But they are primarily insectivores. Their preference is for flying insects, usually eaten on the wing. These skilled acrobats of the air are quite adept at darting, swooping, veering and snatching tasty, winged morsels. If you have swallows using your nest boxes, spend some time watching their foraging flights. You may see them scooping insects from the air into their gaping mouths.
Appearance: The tree swallow is five to six inches long. It is well suited to its airborne lifestyle, with slender body and long, pointed wings. The glossy iridescence of the male's back seems to advertise its sleek and graceful abilities. The male sports a shiny blue-green back, wings and tail contrasting to the white of the throat and belly. Females show the same general plumage pattern but with non-glossy, brown feathers above.
Voice: Listen for the sweet, liquid series of chatters and twitters made by nature's version of the "high performance aircraft."
Pairs Equal Full House
A nest competitor to bluebirds is the tree swallow. While this is a species that many people would like to accommodate, most don't want them nesting at the expense of bluebirds. There is a strategy that allows for both. Because of the competitive nature of birds, most species, including bluebirds and swallows, will not tolerate another pair of their own species nesting close by. But they will allow unrelated species to nest fairly close. Therefore, consider placing nest boxes in pairs -- about 30 feet apart -- rather than singly.
Even if swallows take over some bluebird houses, one nest box of each pair still should be available for bluebirds. If you live in the west, the same strategy applies, but you also contend with violet-green swallows.
Encouraging swallows and bluebirds to nest in close proximity has another advantage. Tree swallows are more aggressive than bluebirds. They will drive egg-damaging house wrens from the area, which is a benefit to both swallows and nearby bluebirds. To help with the identification of nest box occupants: bluebirds line their nests with fine grass, swallows with feathers and wrens with small twigs.